Mobile money market increases 25% to 690 mn accounts: GSMA

Mobile money report from GSMAMobile Money has grown by 25 percent to more than 690 million registered accounts in over 90 countries, said GSMA.

Mobile money net subscriber addition was over 136 million registered accounts – fuelled by growth in customer registrations in 2017.

The mobile money industry processed transactions worth a billion dollars a day, generating direct revenues of over $2.4 billion in 2017.

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“As the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) enter their third year, mobile technology is proving to be an essential tool for delivering these global goals with increased connectivity and innovative services enabling more inclusive communities,” said Mats Granryd, director general of GSMA.

Accelerated growth of bank-to-wallet interoperability, growing adoption of smartphones, the proliferation of fintech companies, and the digitisation of new sectors of the economy are the latest trends in mobile money market in 2017.

GSMA said the growth of the mobile money industry was led by regions other than Africa. South Asia achieved 47 percent growth — becoming the fastest-growing region in terms of registered accounts and represents 34 percent of mobile money registered accounts globally.

Mobile money, which is available in 75 percent of low- and lower-middle-income countries, has become the leading payment platform for a digital economy in many emerging markets.

A number of mobile money services are seeing the proportion of their customer base regularly using their service increase to over 50 percent, especially where providers have a strong distribution network.

More funds are entering and leaving the mobile money ecosystem in digital form; bulk disbursements, bill payments and bank-to-wallet transactions have been the main drivers. In 2017, nearly 25 percent of incoming funds were digital, compared to nearly 12 percent in 2012.

Many providers are decreasing the net cost of the agent network – the cost of managing an agent network can account for more than half of total revenues.