| Global | Payments giant Stripe debuts Corporate Card. The move is another major step for Stripe as it continues to diversify its business and bring on more financial products. Eligible Stripe users receive a Visa card - branded with their company logo - with benefits including cash back rewards, no fees, custom spend controls, real-time expense reporting, and more. Techcrunch |
|
|
| Nigeria | Nigeria's Itex secures CBN licence to operate as super agent. The licence will enable Itex to provide basic financial services such as account opening, BVN capture, funds transfer, cash withdrawals, and bill payments to the unbanked. The super agent licence is part of CBN’s efforts to reduce the financial exclusion rate to 20% by 2020. Nigeria Communications Week |
|
|
| Nigeria | Moody’s assigns B2 corporate rating to Nigeria's Interswitch. The rating agency expects Interswitch to benefit from the positive industry shifts of increasing usage of electronic and digital payment channels. Fintech Africa |
|
|
| Zimbabwe | Steward Bank and Youtap launch mobile money services in Zimbabwe The new service by Steward Bank will allow customers to use e-money to pay at the point of sale and for selected transport services. Mobile Money Africa |
|
|
| Global | Visa, Samsung partner on dongle-less mPOS payments. Samsung and Visa have teamed up to replace dongles with a software-based system that lets merchants accept contactless payments of any amount on their handsets without the need for any additional hardware. The SoftPOS system uses the NFC functionality in a merchant’s smartphone or tablet to let them accept payments from contactless cards as well as NFC-enabled handsets and wearables. Fintech Africa |
|
|
| Global | Mastercard Track expands focus to faster B2B payments, data collection. Mastercard is launching a new B2B payment ecosystem to simplify transactions between suppliers and sellers. Mastercard Track was originally launched in 2018 as a trade platform to address identity, compliance and payment management needs. The trade directory has registered more than 210 million entities worldwide and is central to all current and future B2B payment products. PYMNTS |
|
|
|
Share a tip | Do you have an announcement, event, or job posting you'd like to share, or have you come across an interesting bit of African fintech news recently? Hit reply and let me know! I might be able to include it in next week's newsletter. |
|
Know someone who'd enjoy Decode Fintech? |
|
|
| Twitter | Is Facebook is working on Facebook Pay? Jane Manchun Wong shares an interesting find in this thread |
|
|
|
| Nigeria | Nigerian Stock Exchange prepares to launch X-Mobile to boost investor participation. X-Mobile is a mobile app designed to provide market participants (especially retail investors) convenient, real-time access to the Exchange's activities. With X-Mobile, users can create watch lists to keep track of chosen securities, eliminating the need to access multiple information sources. Proshare |
|
|
| Nigeria | Nigeria's Federal Executive Council (FEC) raises VAT to 7%, seeks National Assembly's rubber stamp. VAT is a type of consumption tax placed on a product at every stage of processing/value addition. The cost is usually paid by the consumer. Zainab Ahmed, Nigerian Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, says the target is to increase government's revenue to 65% of revenue target in 2019, and then 80-85% of revenue target over the next 3 years. Nigeria Communications Week |
|
|
| Namibia | Standard Bank buys stake in Mobipay Standard Bank Namibia Holdings has bought a stake in electronic payment solutions company Mobipay for N$53.2 million (~$3.6m). The bank will take control of Mobipay's services. Mobile Money Africa |
|
|
| Egypt | Egypt’s Central Bank to launch fintech fund. The Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) is reportedly planning to launch a $50 to $100 million fintech fund by early 2020. Egypt’s Minister of Communications and Information Technology Amr Talaat says that this year, the Egyptian government will also launch 7 technological parks in different universities around the country at a total cost of 1 billion Egyptian Pounds (~$60.8 million). Ventureburn |
|
|
|
| Global | Mastercard, R3 team up to bring blockchain to cross border payments. Enterprise software provider R3 is teaming up with Mastercard to establish a blockchain solution for cross border payments. The new blockchain-enabled solution aims to bridge international payments infrastructures, schemes and banks via a Mastercard clearing and settlement network. PYMNTS |
|
|
|
| Nigeria | Central Bank of Nigeria threatens to sanction bank chiefs who breach ePayment rules. The CBN said it will sanction bank chiefs using unapproved third party end-to-end payment solutions. Chief executives of banks who flout the apex bank’s guidelines will get a warning letter with the institution fined NGN 2 million. The regulator has released a guideline on end-to-end electronic payment of salaries, pensions, suppliers and taxes. Nigeria Communications Week |
|
|
| Nigeria | Nigeria's Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is working on how to include blockchain and virtual financial assets in the country's capital market. The SEC has set up a fintech roadmap committee and Blockchain/ Virtual Financial Assets Working group to develop a framework to support innovation and regulation within the blockchain and virtual financial assets' space. The group members include officials from the regulatory agencies, tech experts, and the private sector. Business Insider |
|
|
|
| Nigeria | FairMoney raises 10 million Euros. FairMoney, a Paris-based fintech startup, has closed a $10 million-euro Series A round of investment to scale its engineering team in order to develop a fully-fledged mobile banking offering in Nigeria and beyond. Techmoran |
|
|
| Nigeria | Nigerian online-only bank startup Kuda raises $1.6M. The Lagos and London based company recently launched the beta version of its online mobile finance platform. Kuda plans to use its seed funds to go from beta to live launch in Nigeria by Q4 2019. Techcrunch |
|
|
| South Africa | South African money exchange startup is seeking funding Fourex announced that it has opened its second round of crowdfunding in a bid to raise just over $1 million for global expansion. IT News Africa |
|
|
| South Africa | South Africa's e-commerce startup SnapnSave raises capital from Vunani Capital. The startup, which developed a cash-back grocery coupon app, has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Vunani Capital that will allow them to expand into new markets in 2020. Disrupt Africa |
|
|
|
| Global | Libra forces cryptocurrency regulators to reexamine procedures. Facebook’s Libra project has renewed focus on how cryptocurrencies are regulated, with current rules on the sector patchy and varying from country to country. The Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the global anti-money laundering organization, is monitoring the planned Libra cryptocurrency, a signal of the growing scrutiny on cryptocurrency’s potential for money laundering and terrorism financing. PYMNTS |
|
|
| Global | France and Germany call for public crypto, oppose Libra. The countries released a joint statement that calls out Facebook’s proposed cryptocurrency Libra as potentially harmful to the financial sector, warning that it could block the coin’s authorization in Europe. The two countries are instead throwing their support behind the idea of a public digital currency. PYMNTS |
|
|
|
|
|
