Africa news and trends

Visa Invests in Four African FinTech Startups From Accelerator Program

November 06, 2024
Visa
Mastercard Launches Tokenized Card-Based Bill Pay Solution
Mastercard // October 28, 2024

Mastercard launched a new card-based bill-pay solution for merchants, acquirers, payment facilitators and payment service providers. The new Bill Qkr is live and available globally, the company said in a Monday (Oct. 28) press release. “With Mastercard Bill Qkr, we’re bringing our cutting-edge payment technologies...

Visa and littlefish Team to Help Africa’s MSMEs Go Digital
Digital Payments // October 17, 2024

Visa is teaming with littlefish, an omnichannel platform that helps financial institutions serve small businesses. The  partnership will support micro, small and medium-sized businesses (MSMEs) across Africa by streamlining their in-store and online digital experiences, the companies said Thursday (Oct. 17) in a news release...

Mastercard, Amazon Team to Digitize Payment Acceptance in MENA, S. Africa
Digital Payments // September 30, 2024

Mastercard and Amazon have teamed to digitize payment acceptance in Africa and the Middle East.  The partnership between Mastercard and Amazon Payment Services, announced Monday (Sept. 30), covers countries that include Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates....

JPMorgan Aims to Expand in Africa and Scandinavia
Banking // September 18, 2024

America’s largest bank is increasing its expansion efforts outside the U.S. J.P. Morgan Chase is hiring bankers in cities like Stockholm and Copenhagen to expand its Nordic business and take on European banks, officials from the lender told Bloomberg News in an interview Wednesday (Sept....

Interviews & Exclusives
Liquidity Management Key to Taming FX Volatility in Emerging Markets

November 20, 2023
Compared to the global standard of five to six hubs, moving money between Nigeria and China or Singapore can require navigating through up to 16 hubs before the payment reaches the last mile, said Jess Anuna, founder and CEO of Klasha, a global cross-border payments company. This example illustrates the persistently sluggish, costly and fragmented […]

How Digital Innovation Is Unifying Africa’s Fragmented Payments Landscape

July 06, 2023
In 2019, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said it was time to simplify money movement and make sending money to someone as easy as sending a photo. However, what that statement,...

Digital Escrow Helps Africa’s SMBs Bridge Trade Trust Deficit

May 10, 2023
An estimated $5 billion is lost annually in intra-African trade. And apart from the high trade costs associated with operating in a highly fragmented region, Terence Naidu, founder and CEO...

Africa’s Startup Future Requires VCs to Sell Investors on Potential

March 27, 2023
As the global banking and financial services sector take stock after the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), there are many lessons to be learned, said Maurizio Caio, founder and...

Quick Reads
Visa Invests in Four African FinTech Startups From Accelerator Program

November 06, 2024
Visa is injecting fresh funding into four startups that graduated from the first batch of its Visa Africa Fintech Accelerator program. The investments highlight Visa’s dedication to driving digital innovation within Africa, according to a Wednesday (Nov. 6) news release emailed to PYMNTS. In doing so, the payments giant aims to foster the development of […]

Mastercard Launches Tokenized Card-Based Bill Pay Solution

October 28, 2024
Mastercard launched a new card-based bill-pay solution for merchants, acquirers, payment facilitators and payment service providers. The new Bill Qkr is live and available globally, the company said in a...

Visa and littlefish Team to Help Africa’s MSMEs Go Digital

October 17, 2024
Visa is teaming with littlefish, an omnichannel platform that helps financial institutions serve small businesses. The  partnership will support micro, small and medium-sized businesses (MSMEs) across Africa by streamlining their...

Mastercard, Amazon Team to Digitize Payment Acceptance in MENA, S. Africa

September 30, 2024
Mastercard and Amazon have teamed to digitize payment acceptance in Africa and the Middle East.  The partnership between Mastercard and Amazon Payment Services, announced Monday (Sept. 30), covers countries that...