Nigeria’s telecoms industry leader MTN, has launched its financial services subsidiary called Y’ello Digital Financial Service Limited and mobile money services.
Although the company’s intentions only became public in July 2019 when it received regulator’s approval, the process actually began in 2018 with the registration of the new subsidiary with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC).
What the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) gave MTN is a super-agent licence as clarified by the company’s CEO Ferdi Moolman.
“We are pleased with obtaining a super-agent licence from the Central Bank of Nigeria, which will enable us to build an agent network and accelerate the growth of our fintech business,” Moolman said.
With the license, MTN MoMo agents will be able to offer cash-to-cash transfer for customers, which could be redeemed using the token generated at another agent location.
MTN reportedly invested N50 million in the service in the first half of the year as stipulated by the minimum shareholding requirement of the CBN for a super-agent licence.
However, MTN is not yet licensed to operate a payment service bank although it applied for a license in 2018.
“The Payment Service Banks are expected to provide access to additional financial services such as deposits and savings, peer-to-peer payments, merchant payments and utility payments to the Nigerian population,” PUNCH reported.
