Online spending set to grow by one-third in 2008

Consumers in Brazil will spend BRL8.5 billion ($5.9 billion) online this year, according to e-bit.

E-commerce in Brazil, like so many other key Internet metrics in that country, is maturing fast. Between 2001 and 2007, e-commerce revenues as reported in e-bit's "Web Shoppers" study increased more than tenfold.

The country's growth in online spending is directly related to its rapidly growing population of online buyers, who are among the most-active retail e-commerce users in the world.

The convenience of shopping on the Internet apparently outweighs security concerns for many Web users in Brazil. Six out of 10 Latin American consumers surveyed in April 2008 byAméricaEconomía and Visa said they thought it was safe to make online purchases.

With 55% of respondents in Brazil saying they thought online buying was secure, the country's consumers were slightly less likely than their neighbors to feel safe about retail e-commerce.