Designed to enable businesses collect funds in naira or stablecoins and send payouts to the United Kingdom, Europe, Canada, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria, the new system handles foreign exchange conversion instantly and locks in rates at the point of transaction.

For years, operators in this space have had to manage cash on two fronts. They collect in naira, then look for foreign currency elsewhere, while also keeping reserves ready for payouts. That process ties down capital and slows transactions.

Nomba says its new API removes that limitation by merging collection, conversion and disbursement into one flow. Once funds enter the system, either in naira or stablecoins such as USDT or USDC, conversion happens immediately and the payout begins without delay.

“Running a cross-border payments business from Nigeria has meant managing frozen liquidity on two fronts at the same time,” said Yinka Adewale, CEO, Nomba.

“Operators collect naira, then go source foreign currency, all while their customers are waiting. We built this API to collapse that operational complexity into a single transaction flow, and to give operators who want to remove naira exposure entirely the option to fund in stablecoins.”

Outlining how the payout routes work, the company noted that transfers to the UK go through Faster Payments, with settlement taking between one and three hours.

In Europe, SEPA transfers are completed in under one hour, while Canada supports Interac for instant transfers alongside bank payments. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, users can send money through mobile money or bank transfers, both processed instantly. Nigeria, meanwhile, is the base corridor.

Another feature is a five-minute exchange rate lock. This ensures the rate a customer sees at the start of a transaction stays the same at settlement, reducing disputes and unexpected losses.

The launch comes at a time when cross-border payments in Africa are expensive. On average, sending $200 costs about 7.9%, one of the highest rates globally. At the same time, stablecoins are gaining ground.

They now account for a large share of crypto transactions in sub-Saharan Africa, with Nigeria alone handling billions of dollars in volume over the past year.

On the regulatory aspect, Nigeria’s tax policies treat foreign exchange conversions, service fees and digital charges as taxable events since the start of 2026. This is forcing payment companies to build systems that can handle compliance automatically.

Nomba, which started in 2016 as Kudi, has moved from agency banking into payment infrastructure. In 2025, it processed N122 billion across 1.85 million transactions. Its virtual accounts now account for most of its API activity.

With the new Global Payout API, Nomba is targeting a long-standing problem in the market, cutting out the need to hold funds in multiple currencies at once. The company is ensuring payment firms can move faster and operate with less capital tied up.

The system removes the need for international card networks and reduces processing costs by as much as 80%. It is already live for selected merchants.

One of the early users is a Lagos-based skincare brand founded by a Nigerian entrepreneur. In 60 days, the company recorded hundreds of transactions across its store and online channels. Out of that figure, almost half the transactions came from UK customers paying in pounds.

Between December 10, 2025 and February 8, 2026, the brand received several thousand pounds from more than a hundred unique buyers in the UK. The business also recorded steady growth in its monthly GBP collections, showing high demand from customers abroad.

The entrepreneur said the system simplified how she manages payments across markets.

“Before Nomba, I was juggling Stripe for my UK customers, a separate POS provider for my Lagos store, and a different bank account for transfers,” she said.

“Now everything is in one place. My UK customers pay in pounds from their banking app, I see it instantly, and I can manage my entire business, Lagos and London, from one dashboard. It’s changed everything for me.”

Until now, many Nigerian businesses selling to UK customers relied on card payments processed through platforms such as Stripe.

Fees typically included 2.9% plus 30p for processing, a 1.5% cross-border charge, about 2% for currency conversion and roughly 0.5% to cover chargeback risks. In total, merchants could lose between 6.4 and 7.4% on each transaction.

On £5,522 in sales, that would amount to about £353 in fees.

Under the new arrangement between Nomba and Volume, payments move through the UK’s Faster Payments system using Open Banking.

Customers select bank transfer at checkout, choose their bank and authorise the payment in their banking app using biometric verification or a PIN. There are no card details involved and no chargebacks once payment is approved.

At roughly 1% processing cost, a brand would have paid about £55 on the same £5,522 volume. That means savings of around £298 in two months.

Nomba’s chief executive said the partnership aligns with the company’s goal.

“We built Nomba to give African businesses world-class financial infrastructure. When a customer can run her entire business, POS in Lagos, GBP collections from London, business banking, all of it, from a single platform, that’s the vision coming to life.

“Partnering with Volume to enable direct GBP bank collections means our merchants no longer lose 6–7% of their revenue just because their customers are in a different country.”

A senior executive at Volume added: “Volume’s mission is to make bank payments the default way to pay online. Seeing a Lagos-based beauty entrepreneur collect payments directly from UK bank accounts, with zero chargebacks and a fraction of the cost, is a powerful demonstration of Open Banking’s potential to reshape cross-border commerce.”

The United Kingdom hosts more than 1.5 million people of Nigerian descent. Many run businesses or buy products across both markets. For small brands, fees on cross-border card payments can limit growth.

With this integration with Volume, merchants can receive pounds directly into their Nomba GBP accounts, hold, convert or pay out the funds from the same dashboard used for their Nigerian operations.

For brands, it means one system for Lagos and one for London no longer applies. Everything now sits in one place.

The deal covers a Canadian Payment Service Provider and Money Services Business. With it, Nomba can hold and move Canadian dollars locally and settle those funds directly into naira and other African currencies. 

The setup is built for business payments, not personal remittances.

Trade between Africa and Canada already runs through sectors such as oil and gas services, commodities, consumer goods, professional services and technology. 

Payments in that corridor have mostly passed through correspondent banks, usually taking days and coming with high charges and clouded exchange rates.

Nomba says the new structure removes several of those steps. Businesses can open local CAD accounts in Canada, settle directly into African currencies, and receive funds the same day. The company says foreign exchange and transaction costs can drop by as much as 40 to 60%.

“Cross-border trade payments for African businesses are still built on infrastructure that was never designed for speed or transparency,” said Yinka Adewale, chief executive of Nomba. “Owning regulated infrastructure allows us to remove layers of complexity and give businesses predictable, reliable rails they can build on.”

The company is pitching the service to exporters, importers, professional firms and multinationals trading between Africa and North America. It is not targeting consumer remittance flows.

One early user is a Nigerian oil and gas services firm that bills Canadian clients regularly. Before switching, payments took three to five working days and required manual reconciliation. 

With Nomba, the company now uses a dedicated Canadian dollar account and receives funds the same day, which it can use immediately for wages, suppliers or local investment.

“For businesses, reliability matters more than novelty,” Adewale said. “They want payments to settle when expected and funds to be usable immediately. That’s what owning the rails makes possible.”

The acquisition was completed in the second quarter of 2025. Nomba is putting about $2m into the Canadian entity to strengthen systems and expand capacity. In January 2026 alone, it processed $3.4m through the Canadian setup.

“Now that we’ve demonstrated consistent same-day settlement and rock-solid reliability, we’re opening access more broadly,” Adewale said.

“From a regulatory standpoint, all FX operations run through our Canadian entity, which means businesses are accessing fully licensed, compliant cross-border banking infrastructure.”

Canada is the first in a series of overseas markets where Nomba plans to own regulated payment infrastructure. The company already handles trillions of naira each year across payments and business banking in Africa.

In November 2025, it launched operations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo after a year of groundwork. It holds a Messenger Financier licence and an Aggregator licence from the Central Bank of Congo, allowing it to move money in and out of the country. 

Payments there run through banks including Rawbank, Equity BCDC and TMB, as well as mobile money services such as M-Pesa, Airtel Money and Orange Money.

Nomba says the Congo launch, like Canada, was about proper management of payments infrastructure rather than market size. Canadian companies source minerals and other commodities from the region, but payments have often been slow and fragmented.

In holding licences in both Canada and parts of Africa, the company says it can offer local-currency accounts, transparent pricing and same-day settlement on both sides.

“Africa to Canada is live,” Adewale said. “Africa to the rest of the world is next. Our focus is building global-standard business banking infrastructure that allows African companies to operate locally while being structurally ready to trade anywhere.”

Through this collaboration, Mastercard Gateway will be integrated into Nomba’s Checkout solution, offering businesses a seamless, secure, and efficient way to process transactions and connect with customers locally and globally.

Mastercard’s trusted global infrastructure and cutting-edge technology will help Nomba to elevate its payment solutions, enabling businesses to deliver faster, safer, and more reliable payment options.

By integrating Mastercard’s advanced capabilities, Nomba Checkout will support a variety of payment methods, including international cards, QR codes etc.

This collaboration aims to enhance payment experiences and advance financial inclusion by expanding access to digital payments in Nigeria and across Africa.

Folasade Femi-Lawal, country manager and area business head for West Africa at Mastercard, said:

“As Mastercard continues driving innovation and financial inclusion, we are thrilled to join forces with Nomba in its mission to deliver premier payment solutions to businesses in Nigeria. Our broader mission includes bringing one billion people into the digital economy by 2025, and this collaboration with Nomba is an important step in driving that goal. With our trusted global infrastructure and cutting-edge technology, we are excited to support Nomba in its efforts to drive the growth of digital payment solutions, offering businesses a faster, safer, and more reliable way to connect with customers.”

Jafer Ali Shariff, Head of Product at Nomba, said:

“At Nomba, what excites us is seeing our customers’ growth journey and this collaboration with Mastercard is a fundamental step that unlocks new opportunities. As we work towards building a digital Africa, Mastercard’s global expertise and state-of-the-art technology will allow Nomba Checkout to deliver the speed, efficiency and reliability our customers need to scale their businesses.”

The collaboration brings several benefits for businesses, including enhanced reliability through Mastercard’s secure global infrastructure, improved fraud prevention and data protection tools, and expanded access to Mastercard’s vast network of users.

Faster transaction processing also enables businesses to operate more efficiently, improving cash flow and customer satisfaction.

Looking ahead, Mastercard and Nomba remain committed to expanding the payment ecosystem across Africa.

With the growing demand for digital payment solutions, this collaboration is an important step toward creating a seamless and secure payment landscape that empowers businesses and consumers alike.

Together, Mastercard and Nomba are driving the transition toward an inclusive, digital Africa, one payment at a time.

This was revealed by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) during a meeting between Fintechs and Hussaini Magaji (SAN), the registrar-general/chief executive officer (CAC), in Abuja on Tuesday.

Speaking at the event, the CAC boss said the two-month timeline to register their agents, merchants, and individuals with the commission, was “in line with legal requirements and the directives of the Central Bank of Nigeria”.

“The measure aims at safeguarding the businesses of Fintech’s customers and strengthening the economy,” a statement titled ‘CAC, PoS OPERATORS AGREE TO TWO-MONTH DEADLINE TO REGISTER THEIR AGENTS AND MERCHANTS TO STRENGTHEN THE FINTECH INDUSTRY‘ issued by the CAC added.

He stressed that the action was equally backed by Section 863, Subsection 1 of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, CAMA 2020, and the 2013 CBN guidelines on agent banking.

Magaji explained that the timeline for the registration which will expire on July 7, 2024, was not targeted at any groups or individuals but aimed at protecting businesses.

Several speakers from the Fintech industry pledged to collaborate with the commission to ensure hitch-free implementation of the directive.

Some of them, however, stressed the need for adequate and collective sensitisation, to ensure that the exercise achieved the desired results.

Tokoni Peter, the special adviser to the President on ICT Development and Innovation, in his remarks, pledged to ensure smooth facilitation of the process in line with the Renewed Hope Initiative of the present administration.

The representatives of Opay, Nomba, Palmpay Ltd, PayStack, FairMoney MFB, Moniepoint, and TeasyPay present at the event, later signed up for a document to support the project.

[Credit: ChannelsTV]

Leading Nigerian B2B2C payment startup, Nomba recently announced an oversubscribed round led by San Francisco-based Base10 Partners (investors in Nubank, Plaid, and Brex).

The pre-series B round also saw participants including Helios Digital Ventures, Shopify, Partech, and Khosla Ventures, coming together to raise $30 million.

Yinka Adewale, CEO and co-founder of Nomba speaking noted that the startup sees payment as a business model, not simply a product, while also stating that the business wants to make it easier for businesses to take advantage of all that is possible in their payment processes to support their continued growth and success.

The CEO added that the startup has been working on a variety of products, and the latest investment and investors’ interests gives them a lot of confidence in what can be accomplished when business owners have access to more effective payment methods.

By announcing an oversubscribed round, Nomba had received greater investor supply than they demanded. While several African startups struggled for investors’ attention, Nomba kicked off the new month with a round that saw more investors competing to give them money than they wanted to raise.

Nomba’s business and marketing strategy had seen them change from Kudi to Nomba in April last year. The change of name was in line with the fintech’s desire to shift from a single payment platform to an omnichannel payment platform. New service channels like payment collections, trade finance, business reporting, and multiple location administration have been created by the new omni-channel payment platform, making operations considerably simpler.

Staying Competitive

Nomba has developed over time into a successful, omnichannel payment service provider from its first introduction as “Kudi.ai” in 2016, a chatbot integration that responds to financial demands on social apps. The startup now offers a variety of payment solutions, management and banking tools, and other services to more than 300,000 businesses to help them run their operations more efficiently. The company processes $1 billion in transactions each month, which is the highest gross transaction value (GTV) for an African payment service provider.

Nomba’s progress is no easy feat when considering the competitiveness in Nigeria’s fintech space. With the fintech giants and unicorns like Esusu, Opay and Flutterwave already operating in the target market, Nomba has been able to establish itself as a dominant payment and B2B2C channel for Nigerian businesses and entrepreneurs.

Luci Fonseca, a partner at Base10, expressed excitement on the latest investment as the organisaria as one of africa’s startup power houseion was more than willing to help Nomba provide their revolutionary solutions to fuel business expansion and success both within Nigeria and abroad. According to her, ‘Nomba is one of the most intriguing businesses in Africa because of its history of innovation and capital efficiency.’

A Nigerian Thing

As a major propagator of tech in Africa, it only makes sense that Nigerian startups raise expansion funds. Nigeria functions as the continent’s largest economy, home to 3 of Africa’s 5 ‘unicorns’ (start-ups valued at over $1bn) and has the continent’s largest number of tech-driven companies.

Nigerian startups still possess the qualities required to draw investors and change the financial outlook of the nation and the continent at large, despite the fact that economic uncertainty, escalating inflation, worries about Nigeria’s managed exchange rate, and security concerns have combined to drive away international growth capital.

With its most recent round, Nomba will supply a variety of business tools, including order management and invoicing solutions, which the company claims will increase productivity and save operating costs for companies throughout the continent.

The oversubscribed equity funding round was led by San Francisco-based Base10 Partners (investors in Nubank, Plaid, and Brex), with participation from Helios Digital Ventures, Shopify, Partech, and Khosla Ventures.

Despite the growth in digital payments across Africa, most businesses still only have access to generic point-of-sale machines to support the collection of payments. These machines also typically work in isolation from the rest of the business operations, leading to a variety of inefficiencies in their business processes.

With this new funding, Nomba will deliver payment solutions that have been designed for the specific services that businesses provide, enabling them to plug gaps in their payment processes, operate more efficiently and deliver excellent customer experiences.

For example, restaurants will be able to access menus, manage inventory, receive payments, and perform other business functions all from the same hardware. For transport and logistics companies, Nomba’s solutions will enable them to directly connect their transactions to payments, creating a more seamless experience that increases sales and profitability.

Starting in Nigeria, Nomba will also deliver a range of business tools, including invoicing and order management solutions to improve efficiency and reduce cost of operations for businesses across the continent.

Since launching in 2016 as “Kudi.ai”, a chatbot integration that responds to financial requests on social apps, Nomba has evolved over the years into a profitable, omnichannel payment service provider.

The company supports more than 300,000 businesses with a wide range of payment solutions, as well as management and banking tools that enable better business processes and support business owners to be better at doing business.

The company processes $1 billion in monthly transactions, which represents a market-leading gross transaction value (GTV) for a payment service provider in Africa.

Before this funding round, Nomba had only previously raised $5 million in funding, leveraging those funds to successfully grow the business and efficiently deliver solutions that have positively impacted hundreds of thousands of businesses across Nigeria.

This new capital will enable the company to deliver more solutions for businesses in Nigeria, across Africa ,and in other markets, as the opportunities may emerge.

According to Yinka Adewale, CEO and co-founder of Nomba, “We see payment as a business model, not just a product and we want to make it easier for businesses to take advantage of all that is possible in their payment processes to support their continued growth and success.

We have a long list of products we have been working on and the funds we have raised as well as the investors that have backed us gives us a lot of confidence about what can be achieved with more effective payment solutions in the hands of business owners.”

Luci Fonseca, Partner at Base10 said, “Nomba’s track record of innovation and capital efficiency makes it one of the most exciting startups in Africa. We are thrilled to be supporting them to deliver their game-changing solutions to power growth and continued success for businesses in Nigeria and beyond.”

With a smartphone and an internet connection, borrowers can access credit in minutes, a lifeline for many in a cash-strapped economy. However, as these startups grow, they face a serious challenge: how to assess risk effectively in a market where traditional credit data is scarce.

For startups, this is more than just a numbers game. High default rates can eat into profitability, while ineffective risk models make scaling almost impossible.

But what if startups could use artificial intelligence (AI) to turn these challenges into opportunities?

AI offers powerful tools to assess risk in new and creative ways, unlocking growth and sustainability for digital lenders in Nigeria.

The Risk Assessment Problem

The first hurdle for Nigerian digital lenders is the lack of traditional credit data. Many potential borrowers, farmers, traders, and artisans, operate in the informal economy and lack credit cards, mortgage, or other financial records. For startups, this means they must rely on incomplete or unconventional data to make lending decisions.

This data gap leads to the second problem: high default rates. When you’re essentially guessing a borrower’s ability to repay, it’s not surprising that many loans go bad.

Startups are forced to charge high interest rates to cover their losses, which can alienate borrowers and lead to negative reviews on social media, a death knell in a trust-driven market.

Regulation adds another layer of complexity. Nigeria’s Central Bank has been tightening the rules for digital lenders, particularly around data privacy and loan recovery practices. For startups, the pressure to comply with regulations while staying competitive can feel like walking a tightrope.

Lessons from Other Markets

Globally, AI has already transformed digital lending. In Kenya, for example, mobile-based platforms like M-Shwari analyse mobile phone usage to assess creditworthiness.

The logic is simple: if someone regularly tops up their airtime and pays for mobile services on time, they’re likely to repay a loan.

In India, startups like CreditVidya tap into alternative data such as utility payments, social media activity, and even e-commerce transactions.

This gives them a clearer picture of a borrower’s financial behaviour, allowing them to offer loans to people with no formal credit history.

Even in developed markets like the U.S., platforms like Upstart use AI to look beyond traditional metrics. By analysing data like education and employment history, they’ve significantly reduced default rates while expanding access to credit.

The key takeaway? AI doesn’t need perfect data to work, it just needs the right data.

How AI Can Work for Nigerian Startups

For digital lending startups in Nigeria, the challenge is to adapt these AI-powered strategies to the local context. Here’s how:

• Leverage Mobile Data

With over 220 million mobile subscribers in Nigeria, startups can use mobile phone data to build credit profiles. Call and SMS patterns, airtime purchases, and mobile money transactions can provide valuable insights into a borrower’s habits and ability to manage money.

• Expand Data Sources

Startups can look beyond mobile data to include utility payments, rent records, and even transport app usage. A person who pays their electricity bill on time or frequently uses ride-hailing services likely has the financial discipline to repay a loan.

• Localised AI Models

Off-the-shelf AI models won’t cut it. Nigerian startups need AI solutions trained on local data that account for cultural nuances, such as how different income levels and social structures affect borrowing and repayment behaviour.

• Make AI Transparent

Borrowers in Nigeria are increasingly skeptical of digital lenders, often accusing them of being unfair or predatory. Transparent AI models that explain why a loan was approved or denied can build trust. This also helps startups comply with regulatory requirements.

• Invest in Financial Literacy

Many defaults aren’t due to bad intentions but poor understanding of loan terms. Startups can use AI-powered chatbots to educate borrowers about interest rates, repayment schedules, and penalties. An informed borrower is more likely to repay their loan.

• Prioritise Data Security

Nigerian borrowers are wary of data misuse. Startups must ensure their AI systems adhere to strict data privacy standards. This not only builds trust but also keeps them on the right side of the law. 

Building a Sustainable Model

AI is not a magic wand, it requires investment, expertise, and ongoing refinement. For startups, the journey starts with collecting the right data and partnering with AI developers who understand the local market. Start small, test the model with a limited customer base, and refine it based on feedback.

Scaling comes next. Once the AI system is proven, startups can expand to underserved areas where traditional banks are unable to serve adequately. This doesn’t just drive profitability, it’s also a win for financial inclusion.

By offering affordable, accessible credit to those who need it most, digital lenders can play a key role in lifting Nigerians out of poverty.

The Road Ahead

The digital lending sector in Nigeria is at a crossroads. Startups have the potential to improve access to credit, but the risks of doing business as usual are high. AI offers a way to not only solve the risk assessment problem but also build trust, expand reach, and achieve long-term sustainability.

The Writer;

Henry Bankole is a thought leader with a proven track record in fintech and financial services. With experience spanning both Nigeria and the UK, Henry has consistently driven business growth and championed solutions that bridge financial gaps for underserved communities.

His career began at Nomba, a Y Combinator-backed fintech startup, where he played a key role in expanding its agent network and driving substantial revenue growth.  

Henry is also the co-founder and CEO of Trocah, a UK-based financial services startup, where he is focused on delivering accessible, community-focused currency exchange solutions to immigrant and underserved communities.

As an advocate for financial literacy and inclusion, Henry is committed to creating equitable financial ecosystems that empower individuals and communities to achieve long-term financial stability. He holds a Master’s degree in Management from the University of Bradford and continues to be a trusted voice in the financial services industry.

This is especially valid in underdeveloped nations, where financial fraud can have lasting effects on the financial capability of individuals as well as spread to the Nation.

In my position as a Senior Product Manager at Nomba, I have taken the charge to integrate machine learning algorithms, balance, and approaches by promoting a seamless user experience and high level of security.

Developing economies usually face a lot of challenges when it comes to transactional fraud. The rapid integration of digital financial services, coupled with less comprehensive regular compliance creates enough room for fraudulent activities.

Custom base systems for fraud detection, while important, often fail to address the robust and evolving nature of modern fraud schemes.

This is where AI and machine learning takes an important role, offering dynamic and adaptive solutions that learn, adopt from to resist new threats in real time.

AI and machine learning algorithms have the ability of analysing large amounts of transaction data, identifying patterns and irregularities seen as fraudulent activity.

One of the most important methods is supervised learning, where algorithms are instructed on large datasets consisting of legitimate and fraudulent transactions. By understanding the nature of fraudulent characteristics, these models can identify and predict the chance of fraud in new transactions.

Another robust method is unsupervised learning, which does feed on labelled data. Instead, these algorithms identify oddity and unusual patterns that digress from the usual. Methods such as clustering and anomaly identification are usually needed in locating new types of fraud that have not been detected previously.

Deep learning is a subgroup of machine learning, which further promotes fraud detection enhancement. Neural networks, distinctly convolutional and recurrent neural networks, can apprehend complex relationships and reliability in transaction data.

These models can not only disintegrate individual transactions but train of transactions, identifying signs of fraud that might have been avoided by other techniques.

In the fintech environments, AI and machine learning are used across various layers to enhance security. The most important use case is in real time transaction tracking.

By continuously analysing transactions as they happen. AI systems can issue warnings over suspicious activities immediately, allowing rapid response. For example, if a user’s spending pattern suddenly changes from their usual typical pattern, the system can shut down transactions for the meantime and ask the user for additional information.

Machine learning algorithms can examine biometric patterns, for example facial recognition or fingerprints to ensure that the user initiating a payment is truly authorised. Behavioural biometric, which appraises certain user behaviours like type speed and mouse interactions, add an extra layer of security, making it extremely hard for internet fraudsters to imitate the real  users.

Credit scoring is also promoted through AI and machine learning. In several developing economies, traditional credit data may be limited or totally not in use.

Machine learning models can provide other approaches to data sources, such as social media activity, and mobile phone usage patterns to generate more detailed credit scores.

One of the biggest challenges in deploying AI and machine learning to identify anomalies is achieving the perfect balance between user experience and security.

Excessive security measures can lead to untrue indications where real transactions are identified as scam, causing frustration for users. On the other hand, fair measures may fail to resist fraudulent activities,  undermining trust in the platform.

I discuss extensively on the importance of continuous model training and approval to maintain this balance. Machine learning models should be updated on a regular basis with recent data to modify emerging fraud patterns while reducing false alarms. User feedback plays an important role in this process, providing a clear understanding that assists in remodifying the models.

Moreover, open communication with users about security adoption and the reasons for transaction verifications can promote acceptance and trust. Providing seamless authorization alternatives such as biometric authentication, can enhance security without placing extra resistance to the user experience.

Adopting AI and machine learning for fraud identification and protection in fintech is not just a technological breakthrough but a requisite in the fight against transaction fraud, most importantly in developing economies.

The dynamic and adaptive nature of these tools provides comprehensive solid solutions that custom methods cannot meet.

By navigating specific use cases and algorithm techniques, and by deliberately balancing user experience with security, fintech platforms can safeguard their users and promote trust in digital financial services.

As in the fintech industry, my insights at initiatives at Nomba are making waves for a secure fintech ecosystem.

Feedback

1. Add zone’s switch capability of auto reversal of failed transaction as one of the ways to curb transaction fraud
2. Add zone’s switch as a blockchain technology and/or DeFi which promotes security in fintech industry

More about The Writer:

Chidi Udeze is a Senior Product Manager with a strong focus on cloud solutions, API infrastructure, and digital product innovation. Throughout his career, he has successfully led high-impact projects in the fintech and technology sectors, driving efficiency and growth. Chidi excels at designing and implementing strategic solutions that enhance user experiences, streamline operations, and deliver substantial revenue growth. His leadership in securing key partnerships and fostering digital transformation has made significant contributions to the companies he’s worked with. Chidi has a deep technical background in cloud computing, SaaS technologies, and product management, positioning him as a leader in the tech space.

While it may be Africa’s largest economy (valued at US$500 billion) and the most populous nation on the continent, Nigeria’s business sector remains largely informal. Last year, the country’s informal business sector accounted for around 65% of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). 

What’s more, around half of Nigeria’s 41 million Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs) still solely rely on cash payments – even though digital payments are faster, more reliable and affordable, while decreasing potential risk. 

Digitising Nigeria’s – and indeed Africa’s – economy still has a long way to go, especially in rural areas where the country’s underbanked and unbanked mostly reside and operate. 

Africa’s growing internet penetration makes it well-equipped to harness the power of instant point of sale (POS) transactions, while solving real, everyday problems. And the maturation of exponential technologies and their decreasing cost is helping to democratise the business sector while promoting financial inclusion. In this way, FinTechs across the continent are the gateway into the digital economy.

Across the continent, there are on average five bank branches per 100 000 people, in comparison to 13 elsewhere in the world, according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. Yet a single mobile money agent has seven times the reach of an ATM, and 20 times the reach of a brick-and-mortar bank. 

FinTechs help to leapfrog incumbent ways of banking and doing business, while enabling entrepreneurs to optimise their operations seamlessly and affordably. Much like the other 140-odd FinTechs in Nigeria at last count in 2021, our driving passion at Nomba is to create omnichannel payment solutions that welcome everyone to the digital economy of the future – regardless of their tech adoption or digital literacy.

One of the reasons we founded Nomba (formerly known as Kudi) in 2017 was to democratise access to banking products and services for every Nigerian, while helping to alleviate long queues for simple banking procedures, such as cash withdrawals, deposits and transfers, as well as bill payments and wallet top-ups. 

Through its POS technology, Nomba partners with traditional banks and licensed financial institutions to offer entrepreneurs a unified platform to seamlessly manage their business across multiple touch-points and locations. Nomba’s full-service integrated terminal and dashboard are designed to manage omnichannel payments, whether in cash, cards, transfers, USSD or QR codes.

Today, our fast-growing network of over 150 000 merchants (mobile money agents) process over US$6 billion in payments annually. Our research has found that 20 million Nigerian retailers – whether they be in the formal or informal business sector – are already equipped to process POS transactions. The virtue is that, unlike traditional banking, they can onboard themselves within a matter of minutes via the website or smartphone application without the need for a middle man. 

As developing economies are dusting themselves off after the economic repercussions of the Covid-19 pandemic, imagine the potential this has to empower individuals and businesses by providing them instant liquidity and access to their money – anytime and anywhere. 

This kind of one-stop-shop for financial services and easy-to-use, business-growth tools have the potential to create positive socio-economic impact and spearhead the continent into the Fourth Industrial Revolution without the need to rely too heavily on traditional financial services providers.

There are, without a doubt, various challenges that have already – and still will – come to the fore. A non-exhaustive list includes the need for funding, infrastructure development, and stable telecommunication connections to increase the speed and reliability of payments – all of which cultivate consumer trust. 

However, this is the first step in the race towards paving the way for online payments to become the preferred form of payment by 2030.

Our end game is to enable Africans to become digital natives so as to overcome the digital divide. And with this will come a growth in intra-African trade, cross-border transfers, the development of technological infrastructure and the strengthening of local and regional regulatory policies. And to think that all of these goals can fit into your pocket.