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There are 430 million people in Africa who save $301 billion in saving groups, every year. Our entry market, Ghana, the fastest growing mobile money market in Africa, has about 24 million people in the informal sector. This consists of market traders, farmers and commercial drivers who are having access and the ability to build savings and an online credit history.

There are 430 million people in Africa who save $301 billion in saving groups, every year. Our entry market, Ghana, the fastest growing mobile money market in Africa, has about 24 million people in the informal sector. This consists of market traders, farmers and commercial drivers who are having access and the ability to build savings and an online credit history.

Fawry is yet to announce the results for fourth quarter of 2020 but for the first nine months of last year, the company made about $57 million (EGP 892.7 million) in revenue, an 45.2 percent increase year-on-year basis. For the same period, it doubled its net profit (on a YoY basis) to $7.5 million (EGP 119 million). The company has been witnessing decent growth over the last few years but it seems that Covid-19 has accelerated it even further.

Fawry Microfinance, a subsidiary of the listed Fawry for Banking and Payment Technology Services, intends to borrow at least EGP 300 million from its existing shareholders, Enterprise cited Fawry CEO Ashraf Sabry on December 14th

Fawry’s subsidiary plans to expand its microfinance portfolio to EGP 500 million by the end of 2021, up from EGP 204 million until September 2020, the news portal added.“We have seen solid growth in 2020 and we see the potential of lending to small businesses to finance their working capital and purchases from suppliers,” Enterprise quoted Sabry as saying.

Also, in its quest to become a digital bank, Carbon acquired a microfinance bank license. According to Dozie, the license means that Carbon’s customers are afforded additional protection through depositors’ insurance via the NDIC. The Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation, a federal insurance agency, protects depositors and guarantees the settlement of insured funds when a financial institution can no longer repay their deposits. With that in place, Dozie says the typical Carbon wallet is now a full-fledged bank account, and customers can perform transactions on the platform as they would with any bank.Like Carbon, other startups on the continent have followed suit by releasing year-on-year metrics. In recent memory, most of these startups play in the fintech and crypto-exchange space. But Carbon remains unique amongst this crop of companies as it releases both transaction stats and real insights into its financial performance.Whereas transaction stats tend to highlight a seemingly explosive year-on-year growth of a company, a comprehensive view of financials will likely show a mixed performance. For instance, Carbon generated $17.5 million in revenue for FY2019, up 68% from 2018. For that same period, it recorded a 23% decrease in its profit after tax numbers, a 222% rise in total liabilities and 107% increase in assets finishing the year off with a 6% increase in total equity.It’ll be interesting to see what these numbers look like for 2020. But that’s not the only event to keep an eye on. In addition to its $10 million Series A from SA-based Net1 UEPS Technologies and a $5million debt financing in 2019 from Lendable, Dozie says the digital bank, which also has a presence in Kenya, is ramping efforts to raise a Series B round soon to consolidate its position on the continent.

In 2018, Carbon, a Nigerian fintech startup, made its financials public for the first time. Although typical for foreign private startups, it’s almost an anomaly in Africa. There have been rare cases in the past, for instance, when Rocket Internet had to include Jumia’s financials in its yearly reports after going public. At the time, the German investment outfit was a founding shareholder in the African-based unicorn.

Nigerian digital bank Carbon hit $240M in payments processed last year, up 89% from 2019

South African fintech startup Jumo closed a $55 million round from a diverse group of investors, the company confirmed.

Nigeria, in particular, has become Africa’s unofficial capital for fintech development, surpassing Kenya in 2019 for drawing the most fintech specific and overall VC on the continent

Jumo joins a growing list of African digital-finance startups raising big money from outside investors and expanding abroad.

The MTN Mobile Money (MoMo) platform is closing in on a total of just over two million users since its relaunch in February.

The utilisation of Ethio Pay branded electronic cards will harness the hard currency payment to foreign companies, according to the company's management.

Currently, over six million people are using ATM Visa cards. Founded in 2011, with a capital of 80 million Br, Eth-Switch facilitated transactions worth 2.9 billion Br in the past fiscal year.

The utilisation of Ethio Pay branded electronic cards will harness the hard currency payment to foreign companies, according to the company's management.

FarmDrive’s alternative credit risk assessment model is providing financial institutions with an agriculturally relevant and data-driven model to assess risk and develop loans that fit the needs of smallholder farmers. Not only will this solution unlock millions of dollars of previously risk-averse capital for smallholder farmers, it will improve the livelihoods of entire communities, thereby alleviating poverty, hunger, and inequalities.

Nearly 50 million smallholder farmers in Africa are struggling to support their families and communities through agri-business because less than 10% have their economic needs met by the financial sector. Without access to credit, they remain unable to purchase quality inputs, make productive investments, and improve their production and harvests.

FarmDrive’s alternative credit risk assessment model is providing financial institutions with an agriculturally relevant and data-driven model to assess risk and develop loans that fit the needs of smallholder farmers. Not only will this solution unlock millions of dollars of previously risk-averse capital for smallholder farmers, it will improve the livelihoods of entire communities, thereby alleviating poverty, hunger, and inequalities.

Founded by Peris Bosire and Rita Kimani, FarmDrive delivers productive digital loans and lay away savings products to smallholder farmers in Kenya, helping them grow their incomes and resilience.

South Africa-based financial technology firm JUMO plans to expand in high-growth Asian markets after securing the backing of Goldman Sachs GS.N in an equity funding round, the company's chief executive said.

Since its founding in 2014, JUMO, which helps individuals and small businesses access savings and credit products through their mobile devices, has mainly focused on Africa where the adoption of mobile money has transformed the banking landscape.

JUMO uses behavioural data such as mobile telephone use to help financial services providers and mobile network operators assess lending risk and tailor financial products to those living in developing countries where credit information is scarce.

Over 2.5 billion of the world’s adults remain unbanked and have no access to formal banking or semiformal microfinance institutions according to a report by McKinsey.

Pula Advisors, a fintech firm reimagining agricultural insurance to protect smallholders worldwide, with operations in Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Malawi has partnered with the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP) to deploy satellite-based agricultural insurance to smallholder farmers in Nigeria who are estimated to be around 18 million. With the partnership, Pula will install satellite technology to track a wide range of catastrophes cost effectively, at speed and without missing out on any areas.

“We hope that the high-quality yield and satellite data available today will enable local insurers and Pula Advisors to create an innovative yield predictive model that decreases the cost of area yield index insurance. At the end of the day, we want to make this product more accessible to smallholder families, allowing them to invest with more confidence and increase their yields,” said Emilio Hernandez, who leads CGAP’s work with smallholders.

Women constitute the majority of remittance recipients globally and remittances have an impact on both women’s actual income as well as on social normsRemittances are believed to directly touch the lives of 1 billion people globally, maintaining millions of receiving families above the poverty line with remittances often representing 60 per cent or more of household income.

Remittances are believed to directly touch the lives of 1 billion people globally, maintaining millions of receiving families above the poverty line with remittances often representing 60 per cent or more of household income. Globally, women represent almost half of the 258 million migrants and back home in the countries of origin, women represent the majority of remittance recipients.

data from WorldRemit indicates that in 2014, 20.46 per cent of their female customers globally would use mobile money as payout mechanism compared to only 13.99 per cent of men.

Leading application to send and receive payments in Nigeria, with more than 8.4 million users. Founded in 2009 with the simple belief that technology can transform lives by delivering universal access to financial services, Paga is now the top mobile payment service in Nigeria, used by more than 12 million individual users, while employing nearly 22,000 Paga agents. Anyone with a mobile phone can send money to the recipient's mobile phone number which can then be collected either through a Paga agent or an ATM without the use of a card. Paga can also be used for airtime credits, bill payments, and retail. The company is constantly evolving to bridge the gap between commerce, financial services, and economic development within Nigeria's emerging economy.

The $6 million investment will help Fawry, a local company, extend its network of payment terminals across Egypt, a country heavily reliant on cumbersome cash transactions. That is expected to help consumers pay bills and make it easier for businesses to receive payments, stoking commerce and economic growth.

The investment is also designed to help restore investor confidence in Egypt and create jobs in its burgeoning high-tech sector.

JUMO builds its credit profiles using behavioral data gathered from mobile wallets, cell phones and transaction data.

JUMO is a transaction and predictive technology platform that partners with mobile network operators and banks to offer customers microloans and access to savings and insurance products. They are currently active in six markets – Ghana, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia and Pakistan – with plans to soon launch in India, Bangladesh, Côte d’Ivoire and Nigeria. JUMO has helped disburse over $1.6 billion in funding to small and micro enterprises, and has helped connect over 15 million people to credit and savings services.