Tech Bytes: No Post-Holiday Letdown in E-Commerce

Cybercash Inc. has released transaction volume details supporting other companies' and researchers' findings that the boom in holiday-season electronic commerce has carried over into 1999.

Cybercash, a leader in Internet transaction processing, said its volume increased by about 30% from the day after Thanksgiving until Christmas, and has dipped by no more than 5% since.

James Condon, the company's president and chief operating officer, said physical-world merchants typically experience much more drastic post- holiday sales declines.

"Everyone agrees that e-commerce came of age during the 1998 holiday shopping season," Mr. Condon said.

"If these statistics tell us anything," he said, it is "that for the most part, people enjoyed their experience shopping on-line during the holidays and have kept it up. That is a very good omen for the continued growth of e-commerce."

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