Five years after its landmark acquisition by global payments giant Stripe, Nigerian fintech company Paystack has reported group-level profitability, driven by a more than 12-fold increase in payment volumes and a steadily expanding pan-African footprint.
Paystack’s payment volume has significantly and rapidly grew. For instance, it was widely reported that the company hit N1 trillion in a single month (July 2024) for the first time in Nigeria, processing millions of transactions across Africa (Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, etc.), handling major volumes of online payments, and seeing huge growth in bank transfers (over 50% of Nigerian transactions in 2023).
The milestone underscores how the 2020 acquisition, one of the most high-profile fintech deals in Africa at the time, has reshaped Paystack’s scale, reach, and business fundamentals.
From Early-Stage Scale to Infrastructure Giant
At the time of its acquisition by Stripe in 2020, Paystack was widely regarded as one of Africa’s fastest-growing payment startups, serving tens of thousands of businesses across Nigeria and Ghana.
While the company did not publicly disclose its transaction volumes then, industry estimates and ecosystem data suggest Paystack was already processing several billions of dollars annually in payments.
A 12x increase since that period implies that Paystack is now handling tens of billions of dollars in payment volume, placing it firmly among Africa’s largest payment infrastructure providers by throughput.
The company says this rapid scale-up has been achieved without sacrificing reliability, compliance, or product quality, a discipline that has now translated into profitability at the group level.
Stripe’s Role in Accelerating Growth
Stripe’s acquisition of Paystack in 2020 was seen as a strategic bet on Africa’s digital economy and Paystack’s ability to build world-class financial infrastructure tailored to the continent.
Since then, Paystack has expanded beyond its early West African base and is now licensed and operational in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Côte d’Ivoire, and South Africa, with regulatory approvals secured for Egypt and Rwanda. Together, these markets account for roughly 46% of Africa’s GDP.
The company attributes its growth to a product-first expansion strategy, prioritising deep local compliance, merchant experience, and reliability over rapid but shallow market entry.
Holding Company Signals Bigger Ambitions
Riding on its profitability milestone, Paystack has announced the launch of The Stack Group (TSG), a new parent holding company that will aggregate a growing family of technology-driven brands.
Founding shareholders of TSG include Stripe, Shola Akinlade, Paystack’s founder and CEO, and existing Paystack employees.
Agreements establishing TSG as the parent company were signed in October 2025, subject to regulatory approvals.
The move signals a shift from being a single-product payments company to a multi-brand technology group addressing broader challenges faced by African businesses.
At launch, TSG includes:
- Paystack – focused on merchant payments
- Zap – focused on consumer payments
- Paystack Microfinance Bank (MFB) – focused on banking and credit infrastructure
- TSG Labs – focused on emerging technologies and new product development
Deepening the Financial Stack
A key pillar of Paystack’s post-acquisition evolution has been its move deeper into financial infrastructure. The recent launch of Paystack Microfinance Bank (MFB) in Nigeria allows the group to internalise critical banking rails and provide credit and account services to more than 300,000 Nigerian merchants.
According to the company, this integration enables compliant, end-to-end money movement solutions, a crucial requirement for scaling payments across Africa’s fragmented financial systems.
Commenting on the announcement, Shola Akinlade, founder and CEO of Paystack, said the launch of TSG reflects a broader vision shaped by nearly a decade of working with African businesses.
“The launch of TSG signals a larger scope of ambition for us and sets the tone for the next decade of our company. Having worked with thousands of companies across the continent since 2016, it is clear that there are significant opportunities to support businesses beyond payments.”
The announcement comes as Paystack prepares to celebrate its 10-year anniversary in January 2026, marking its evolution from a Lagos-based startup into a profitable, pan-African fintech group backed by one of the world’s most influential payments companies.
