Businesses Drive Surge in Africa’s Mobile Money Economy as PawaPay Hits 3 Billion Transactions

Mobile money is increasingly becoming a key tool for businesses operating across Africa. Growing demand for digital collections and payouts has helped PawaPay process more than 3 billion transactions since its launch.

The UK-based fintech said it reached its third billion transactions in less than nine months, reflecting the rapid adoption of mobile money by companies managing payments across multiple African markets.

The firm has also doubled its daily transaction volume to about five million payments and handled more than €10 billion ($11.63 billion) in transactions since it was established in 2020.

PawaPay’s platform connects businesses to nearly 50 mobile network operators in 20 African countries through a single application programming interface (API), allowing merchants to process payments across several markets without building separate integrations for each country.
The milestone comes as Africa’s mobile money ecosystem continues to expand.

Industry data shows the continent’s mobile money economy was valued at approximately $1.4 trillion in 2025, while global mobile money transactions exceeded $2.1 trillion.

Merchant payments remain the fastest-growing segment of the sector. According to GSMA data, merchant transaction volumes rose 42 percent year-on-year to $155 billion, while the number of active merchants increased by 59 percent.

PawaPay Chief Operating Officer Jamie Steell attributed the sector’s growth to a combination of demographic and technological factors, including a young population, more affordable smartphones, lower internet costs and the ongoing digitisation of commerce.

The company identified Ghana, Tanzania, Cameroon and Uganda as some of the strongest growth markets on its network. Nigeria also remains a significant opportunity, although its payments landscape differs from many African countries because fintech-led wallets such as OPay and PalmPay have gained greater prominence than telecom-operated mobile money services.

The latest figures underscore how mobile money is evolving beyond person-to-person transfers into a critical infrastructure for business transactions, helping drive digital commerce across the continent.