New Telegraph

Nigeria, others push mobile money transactions to $495bn

Nigeria and other West African countries recorded a 43 per cent increase in the value of mobile money transactions in 2020, thereby propelling the continental value to $495 billion. According to a GSMA report, the sub-region recorded the largest growth in mobile money in the year.

 

The 2021 State of the Mobile Industry report revealed that mobile money transactions valued at $178 billion were recorded in West Africa, while the volume of deals stood at 6.4 billion.

 

Southern Africa came second in terms of growth, recording a 24 per cent increase as the value of transactions stood at $3 billion. “As predicted in last year’s State of the Industry report, registered accounts in Africa comfortably surpassed the halfbillion mark.

 

“Sub-Saharan Africa has been at the forefront of the mobile money industry for over a decade and, in 2020, continued to account for majority of growth (43 per cent of all new accounts.

 

“By the end of the year, there were 548 million registered accounts in the region, over 150 million of which were active on a monthly basis. Although absolute growth was highest in West and East Africa, Southern Africa grew the fastest at 24 per cent year on year,”

 

GSMA stated  the report. Highlighting national commitments to the growth of mobile money in Africa, the report commended Ghana for being the first African country to launch a universal QR code enabling all Ghanaians to make instant merchant payments from their mobile money wallets, bank accounts, or international cards. Nigeria followed suit earlier this year with the launch of the NQR payment solution.

 

According to the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS), the solution would unify the available closed QR Code schemes in the country for consistent user experience and accelerated digital adoption.

 

Globally, GSMA said the number of registered mobile money accounts grew by 12.7 per cent to 1.21 billion accounts – double the forecast growth rate.

 

“Apart from changes in consumer behaviour, this impressive uptake was due to regulators implementing more flexible Know Your Customer (KYC) processes and relaxing onboarding requirements to make it easier to open an account.

 

“The fastest growth was in regions where governments provided significant pandemic relief to citizens. Account activity grew at an even faster rate. There are now over 300 million monthly active mobile money accounts. “Not only are customers using their accounts more frequently, but they are using them for new and more advanced use cases.

 

This suggests that more and more people are moving away from the margins of financial systems and leading increasingly digital lives,” the report stated. GSMA added that transaction values also grew across the board as more money circulated and was cashed-in and cashed-out than ever before.

 

“For the first time, the global value of daily transactions exceeded 2 billion dollars, and is expected to surpass $3 billion a day by the end of 2022.

 

“While 2020 saw unparalleled challenges brought on by COVID-19, the mobile money industry witnessed strong efforts in striving towards cashless societies, entering strategic partnerships to expand the horizons of digital payments and developing new and robust interoperable payment systems,” it said.

 

It noted that while it took nearly a decade for the mobile industry to reach its first 100 million monthly active accounts, it has taken just over five years to reach another 200 million.

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