Fintechs - Nigerian and South African Banks
In South Africa, the banks are buying fintechs or taking strategic stakes in fintechs. Sasfin, a South African bank, just took a stake in Payabill, a Johannesburg-based fintech company which began life in 2017, offering financial services to small businesses.
In Nigeria, banks run incubation or acceleration, possibly to find the best fintechs they can “partner” and scale via their channels. It is possible the banks are taking stakes in some of the fintechs but public data shows nothing like that. Of course Nigerian banks have “participated” in companies like Interswitch but recently I see more incubation with promise to provide channels for scaling than pure direct investment.
I do think regulation could be the reason why Nigerian banks are not as bold as South African banks in investing in these new companies.
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