"It is clear that digital payments are very important to many financial institutions," Bareisis said. "However, it appears to be an area in which many are struggling to determine how much and where to invest."

He added credit unions and banks should determine where consumers experience the most friction, as it is an area most vulnerable to attack from third parties. They should also accelerate EMV migration, especially for debit cards, to free up resources for digital payments.

Twenty-nine percent of survey participants finished migrating all credit cards to EMV, while 17% are done with debit. However, many others are just starting with debit and prepaid. Seventy-one percent of respondents had migrated less than 20% of their debit and prepaid cards.

Meanwhile, 63% of responding credit unions used a "big bang" method (i.e., all at once) to migrate their credit cards to EMV, compared to 35% of banks. Accelerated migration was the overriding EMV strategy for debit cards, while replacement of prepaid cards usually took place as they expired.

Other findings from the report included:

• Visa Checkout and MasterPass have seen limited traction among the survey participants so far, but as many as 31% of respondents consider participating in CurrentC, a merchant-owned mobile payment system.

• Only the most optimistic 6% of respondents expect more than 20% of in-store transactions will be initiated via mobile in three years; 42% expect to get there in five years.

The report was the third in a series based on Celent's Digital Research Panel. Celent surveyed 42 panelists in November 2015 about digital payments priorities.