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WorldCover investor and EchoVC founder Eghosa Omoigui believes the startup’s insurance offerings can actually help farmers improve yield. “Weather-risk drives a lot of decisions with these farmers on what to plant, when to plant, and how much to plant,” he said. “With the crop insurance option, the farmer says, ‘Instead of one hector, I can now plant two or three, because I’m covered.’ ”

WorldCover’s platform uses satellite imagery, on-ground sensors, mobile phones and data analytics to create insurance options for farmers whose crop yields are affected adversely by weather events — primarily lack of rain.

Mukuru specialises in single transfers to friends and family, whether over the phone, through the app, online, bank transfers or through one of its branches. You can’t set up a recurring transfer through Mukuru and it doesn’t specialise in business transfers.You can make transfers to any of the following, depending on the country you’re sending to:Bank account. The money will be deposited directly into the bank account you choose. You’ll need to know the SWIFT code as well. This option is currently available for all supported countries.Cash pick-up location. You can send money to a cash pick-up location for your recipient to collect. If you choose this option, the person picking it up will need a valid photo ID on hand and the reference number. You’ll only be able to use this for transfers to Zimbabwe, Malawi, Namibia and Zambia.Mobile wallet. Send to your recipient’s smartphone wallet. This option is helpful if your recipient doesn’t have a bank account and isn’t near a cash pick-up location. You can use it in Zimbabwe, Malawi and Mozambique.Top-up card collection. This is used when you want to send money directly to your recipient’s card. You’ll need their card number and address. This is currently only available in Zimbabwe.

M-Pesa is a virtual banking system that provides transaction services through a SIM card. Once the SIM has been inserted into the card slot of the mobile device, users can make payments and transfer money to vendors and family members with SMS messages. Users with no bank accounts can access the numerous M-Pesa outlets distributed across the country. The money that needs to be stored is given to the kiosk attendant, who transfers the amount in digital form to the user’s M-Pesa’s account. Cash collected from M-Pesa is deposited in bank accounts held by Safaricom. The bank accounts serve as regular checking accounts and are insured up to a maximum of 100,000 shillings (or $1000) by the Deposit Protection Fund. M-Pesa provides receipts as proof of transaction. For a transaction to take place, both parties have to exchange each other’s phone numbers because the phone numbers act as account numbers. After settlement, both parties receive an SMS notification with the full name of the counterparty and the amount of funds deposited or withdrawn from the user’s account. The mobile receipt, which is received within seconds, helps to promote transparency for all individuals involved in a transaction.

GreenTec, headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, will invest an undisclosed amount of money in Bismart to enable the company upscale its digital and online platforms to connect customers to insurance and investments solutions available in the African market.The agreement, announced in Frankfurt, will see Bismart benefit from GreenTec’s expertise and experience in funding start-ups in Africa through capacity building, and process optimization.GreenTec will also avail to the Kenyan company a team of international experts to help implement adapted latest technology to the model in order to extend its local value chain and have more impact.

GreenTec, headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, will invest an undisclosed amount of money in Bismart to enable the company upscale its digital and online platforms to connect customers to insurance and investments solutions available in the African market. The agreement, announced in Frankfurt, will see Bismart benefit from GreenTec’s expertise and experience in funding start-ups in Africa through capacity building, and process optimization.

“The business is growing and we plan to attract new talent. We are growing globally into Africa and other markets and we are constantly enhancing our technology,” said Thomas.

The chatbot will also enable 24/7 instant customer service for its customers across Africa and Europe. Daniel Howard, CTO for SimbaPay, says: “Another major objective we achieved with the chatbot service is that it also works without internet. This means customers with a mobile phone, even a basic phone without internet access, can access the SimbaPay chatbot using SMS.” Together with Interswitch, SimbaPay says its B2B division offers its instant remittance technology to banks and telcos who want to provide their customers with the service. To send money with an SMS users need the recipient’s phone number and the chatbot will automatically obtain the recipient bank account or mobile money details.

Millions of people in developing countries depend on microloans to raise the funds to grow a business or just stay afloat in hard times. And thanks to digital platforms, smartphones and free-moving global capital, growing numbers of people in the rich world are using their money to lift others out of poverty.

But the reality is often a lot messier – something that may not initially be obvious to the lender. In fact, like Cabusog and Lendwithcare, borrowers and crowdfunding sites connect via local partner microfinance institutions (MFIs) who do the essential work of assessing creditworthiness and administering loans. To pay for that, most MFIs charge interest to borrowers, often at wildly varying rates.

Kiva is the slickest of the microfunding websites, offering a mind-bogglingly glossy catalogue of projects sorted into different categories, countries and attributes, all illustrated with backstories and pictures.

"Our commitment of up to $1 million in funding to address the growing wealth inequality in the United States is not only the right thing to do, but a necessity,"

Kiva's crowdfunding platform, Kiva.org, allows individuals to lend as little as $25 to make a difference in someone's life. Kiva Protocol aims to establish financial identity and credit history for unbanked populations using distributed ledger technology (DLT), with its inaugural project currently being implemented in Sierra Leone.

Thndr, an Egypt-based startup has announced that it has received the first new brokerage license in the country in over a decade. Thndr recently acquired the necessary licensing from the Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA). 

Ahmad Hammouda, Co-Founder and CEO at Thndr said Egypt is expected to be the 7th largest economy by 2030 and has more than 100 million people, most of which are young and are looking for a convenient and digital way to invest their money. “That’s why we are excited to bring a new breed of young investors to the market” he added.

FinTech Innovation Challenge “Making Finance Work for Women 2019” Award! Pula is an agriculture insurance provider for smallholder farmers in African emerging markets lead by CEO and cofounder Rose Goslinga. They are radically restructuring agricultural insurance, using technology to insure the previously unbanked, uninsured, untapped market of 1.5 billion smallholders worldwide.

The company was recognized for successfully managing over 4.3 million smallholder farmers through their Area Risk Index and yield insurance product. It provides insurance services and digital solutions to farmers in Africa. The company uses the crop cut experiment as a claim assessment procedure. This assessment relies heavily on ground crop cuts and it’s fed on mobile apps which relay instant feedback to clients. 

Pula is providing radically restructured agriculture insurance for smallhold farmers in Africa. Using satellite technology and data to provide previously uninsured landowners with a better safety net, Pula policies are free for the farmers. Premiums are paid by input companies or farm aggregators whose business interests are served by protecting farmers’ incomes.

Innovate Finance is delighted to be supporting this strategic review of the UK FinTech sector. Over the last few months we have seen exponential growth and change in the adoption of digital financial services. We are at a pivotal moment with regards to our economy and now have a unique opportunity to reflect on the success of UK FinTech. We have the best in class in terms of innovation and should consider what more we can do to fully embed it within our wider financial services. We look forward to working with Ron Kalifa and stakeholders across the ecosystem to develop a shared blueprint for growth of the UK’s financial services sector that has technological innovation at its core

“Businesses, as well as Kenyans and expatriates with friends and family abroad, send over US$18 billion to other African countries, Asia and Europe annually with several billion Kenya Shillings going through the Simbapay network. Therefore, this service will offer Prime Bank’s customers a world-class fully digital international money transfer service,” added Karanja.

Prime Bank’s Director for Business Development, Vijay Kantaria, said the tier 2 lender has embarked on investment in technology through partnering with various FinTechs to accelerate its digital integration plan.

Less than six months after becoming the first billion-dollar technology company in Egypt, Fawry has hit another milestone by surpassing the $2 billion market cap for the first time. Its stock has doubled in the last six months and closed at an all-time high of EGP 46.90 today, pushing its market cap to over EGP 32 billion. This makes it the fourth most valuable company listed on The Egyptian Exchange (EGX) and it seems that it’s only a matter of days before it takes the second position. The Egyptian payments firm had gone public in August 2020 by listing its shares on EGX at the price of EGP 6.46 per share. The share price has surged over 7x after company’s public market debut about eigtheen months ago.

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.

Family Bank Limited, a leading bank in Kenya, has partnered with London-based financial technology firm SimbaPay to launch an instant money transfer service from Kenya to China through WeChat – a service that will help boost Kenya-China trade. Over seven million customers and businesses in Kenya will now access SimbaPay’s international money transfer service to send money to China’s WeChat Pay from Family Bank’s PesaPap mobile banking application and USSD service. Non-customers too will enjoy the service via a dedicated PayBill number 261059 on MPESA.

In addition to the China (WeChat) service, SimbaPay also supports money transfer to Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Ghana, Nigeria, Madagascar, Niger and India. 

China is Kenya’s biggest trading partner. In 2017 alone, businesses in Kenya imported well over USD 4 billion worth of goods from China. The current existing solutions for sending money to China take multiple days to reach the recipient’s bank account, with some requiring the supplier to physically visit an agent to collect their money. This new service easily overcomes these barriers.

FinTech companies such as PayPal, Visa, Square, Mastercard and others are expanding cryptocurrency (crypto) and blockchain capabilities but several factors could limit widespread acceptance in the near term, says Fitch Ratings. We expect strategic crypto investments to have a limited near-term effect on credit profiles, given modest capital deployed and the long ramp time. However, adding crypto capabilities opens up incremental revenue streams for these companies, even if the return on investment over time and compliance risks are uncertain.

Vigor Crypto Labs set up to formalize the testing of the trading strategies in preparation for B2B commercialization WASHINGTON, DC, Feb. 11, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- via NewMediaWire -- Xalles Holdings Inc. (OTC: XALL), a fintech holding company providing technology and financial services solutions, announces strategic initiatives to capitalize on the growing digital asset and cryptocurrency market.