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OPINION: Safaricom plays hardball in Equitel-M-Pesa Battle
In one single move, Safaricom has potentially pulled the rug from under Equity Bank's poorly hidden plan to eat their lunch, dinner and breakfast.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- mobile finance
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July’s Most Popular Posts on NextBillion: From the value of female mobile money agents to the power of Latin America’s BoP
From the benefits of training women as mobile money agents to the remarkable size and vibrancy of Latin America's BoP, the month of July brought some compelling content to NextBillion. We highlight the three most-read and most-shared posts of the month.
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- Agriculture, Energy
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Consumers lose out as Safaricom and Equity tariff wars intensify
A fresh storm is brewing between Kenya’s financial services giants, Safaricom and Equity Bank, over the rates being levied to consumers making transactions across the two service providers.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Will West Africa be the New East Africa in Mobile Money?: Shifting regulations and a growing ecosystem make the region an area to watch
Though the member countries in the West African Economic and Monetary Union share one currency and one central bank, their mobile money ecosystems differ greatly. However, interoperability will likely be integrated across most of these countries in the not too distant future. Could its new regulatory regimes and developing ecosystems help the region take its place alongside the mobile money sprinters of East Africa?
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- Technology
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Indian mobile operators feature strongly among ‘payments bank’ license winners
Bidders linked to the country’s top three mobile operators – Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular – as well as newcomer Reliance Jio Infocomm and Telenor were among eleven winners of payments bank licenses in India.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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A Hundred Apps Bloom in China as Millions Bank on Their Phones
Consumers are skipping straight from cash to mobile finance.
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- Technology
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Kenyan banks take on M-PESA in fight for money transfer billions
Kenya Bankers Association plans to launch an interbank mechanism to enable interoperability across member banks for all retail payment streams, aiming to eat into M-PESA’s market share.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Fast Lane to the Future: Three ways the ‘leapfrog effect’ is transforming developing countries – and revolutionizing finance
The “leapfrog effect” refers to the phenomenon, in fast-growing emerging economies, of technological advances permitting shortcuts in infrastructure building. This saves considerable time and money – and can deliver quick results that took more developed countries decades to attain. Here are three ways the leapfrog effect is reshaping economies – and finance – in the developing world.
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- Technology