The Geneva-based United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) ranked the Swiss 14th in an index that measures the capacity of countries to facilitate purchases on the internet.

The agency estimates that the global volume of business to consumer (B2C) transactions is worth around $1.2 trillion a year.

Between now and 2018, the domain will be worth an estimated $2.4 trillion a year, UNCTAD said.

It measured the ability of 130 countries around the world to conduct such transactions, taking into account such factors as use of the internet, data-secure servers, the rate of penetration of credit cards and home postal delivery.

Its B2C E-commerce Index for 2014 ranks Luxembourg in first place, followed by Norway, Finland, Canada, Sweden, Australia and Denmark.

“The index allows countries to compare their readiness with others and also indicates their relative strengths and weaknesses in different elements of the e-commerce process, such as the quality of the internet infrastructure and the availability of payment and delivery solutions,” UNCTAD said.

The ranking is included in the international organization’s Information Economy Report 2015.

Most of the top e-commerce companies are from the United States and China, the report said.

In terms of gross merchandise value, the top e-commerce sites were the Alibaba Group (China), Amazon (US) and eBay (US).

Switzerland ranks among the top countries in the world for home postal delivery and secure servers, but it does less well when it comes to credit card access and the use of the internet by individuals, the report said.