Kenya’s banks are aiming to compete with M-Pesa mobile money transfer with their own product, PesaLink. Their plan is to undercut M-Pesa on fees, but they will only serve bank account holders at first.
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M-Pesa News
M-Pesa is Kenyan mobile, phone-based payment service provider for the mobile companies’ customers. M-Pesa is a money transfer service that, additionally, provides financing and micro-financing operations. The company was launched in 2007 by the two largest mobile network operators in Kenya and Tanzania. In 2013, M-Pesa in Africa became available for money transfers in Bitcoin, which are very popular among Kenyan and other African countries’ citizens due to their national currencies’ hyperinflation. Initially, M-Pesa was developed for Kenyan and other African citizens who don’t have access to ATMs or bank accounts to send or receive money, but the service has now reached Afghanistan and some European countries.
Nigeria and Africa generally are showing a huge sign of optimism for Bitcoin trading. But there are some challenges to overcome.
2456Larry Christopher Bates of BitLand tells CT why digital currency community needs to stop the hype, do due diligence, and stop treating crypto like a get rich quick scheme.
876The non-for-profit Stellar network has launched a Blockchain-backed money transfer to compete with SWIFT.
1827It has been revealed recently that Safaricom, a leading Kenyan mobile network operator, tried to shut down a promising Bitcoin startup. Are monopolists that much afraid of losing out to Bitcoin?
1347M-Pesa operator Safaricom will not be required to grant access to bitcoin startup BitPesa amid an ongoing legal dispute. What are the consequences?
905In the face of difficult challenges, the African continent is determined to make a significant impact in the cryptocurreny ecosystem, especially with Bitcoin.
706Michael Bumann has been in Nairobi, Kenya for several months updating himself on the tech scene there.
1939What happened this week in crypto innovation? Here's all the news that's fit to print
730Safaricom, the mobile network operator behind M-Pesa has released an Application Programming Interface (API) for all developers who want to create solutions tied directly into their payment systems.
843Safaricom customers were greeted with the news that they should prepare themselves for an M-Pesa service shutdown over the coming weekend, on April 18 and 19.
1785Being a Kenyan, who uses both the mobile money service and bitcoin, it made me think about how the two technologies compare.
2925Juniter’s prediction of 5 million Bitcoin users by 2019 sounds lackluster, but if current activity in Africa is sustained, it could also be proven meaningless.
575If you are a member of Africa’s expanding diaspora, then Bitcoin could potentially hold the key to a better life for your friends and relatives in the motherland. Many nations on the African continent are dependent on money transfers from abroad known as remittances.
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