GSMA report: more than half a billion registered mobile money accounts globally

 With 277 live services in 92 countries, mobile money is now available in 66 per cent of low- and middle-income markets. In December 2016 alone, the industry processed 1.3 billion transactions, averaging around 30,000 transactions a minute.

The GSMA unveiled its sixth ‘State of the Industry Report on Mobile Money’, offering a current snapshot of the mobile money landscape and highlighting the impact of mobile money on lives, economies and innovation over the past 10 years. The report provides the only comprehensive picture of mobile money around the globe. This edition looks back across the decade since the pioneering launch of M-Pesa in Kenya, which first demonstrated the potential of mobile technology to transform access to financial services. Today there are more than half a billion registered mobile money accounts across 92 countries.

“Giving underserved people access to digital payments has expanded financial inclusion to hundreds of millions of people in developing countries and has enabled them to be more secure, more empowered and more active contributors to local communities,” said Mats Granryd, Director General, GSMA. “Mobile operators have been at the centre of this success story. The reach and impact of their services provides a clear example of how important the mobile industry is to ensuring achievement of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals.”

The research further shows:

. More than half a billion registered mobile money accounts globally, as of the end of 2016;
. Nearly 174 million accounts that are active (on a 90 day basis);
. There are 35 mobile money services with over 1 million active accounts;
. More than 4.3 million mobile money agent outlets, with 30 countries now having 10 times more active mobile money agents than bank branches; and
. The average cost of sending international remittances using mobile money is less than half the cost of doing so via a global money transfer operator.

„As the industry looks to new growth opportunities, the emergence of harmonised application programme interfaces (APIs) could unlock a wave of innovation and further extend the reach of mobile money services. To this end, the GSMA today launched a developer portal for platform vendors and the technical community, which will help ensure compatibility with GSMA industry-standard Mobile Money APIs.

This approach can ensure interoperability across the ecosystem, seamless deployment and access to the latest standard APIs, through which developers can build mobile money products and services. The developer portal is free and will allow users to access a real, production-ready test environment. The portal offers an open and accessible way to work technically with the APIs and will be supported by the majority of vendors throughout the mobile money industry, with the aim to accelerate further industry growth.”, according to the press release.

About the GSMA
The GSMA represents the interests of mobile operators worldwide, uniting nearly 800 operators with almost 300 companies in the broader mobile ecosystem, including handset and device makers, software companies, equipment providers and internet companies, as well as organisations in adjacent industry sectors. The GSMA also produces industry-leading events such as Mobile World Congress, Mobile World Congress Shanghai, Mobile World Congress Americas and the Mobile 360 Series of conferences.