South African telecoms group MTN and retail giant Pick n Pay launched on Thursday (Nov 22) a mobile money transfer system, the first of its kind in Africas biggest economy, BDay Live reported. The mobile banking system, called Tyme Capital, will allow mobile phone users to set up an account from their phones and send and receive money via their headset. Cash deposits and withdrawals will be done through Pick n Pays chain of 775 retail outlets, as well as its Boxer Superstores. The Tyme account has an upper limit of ZAR 25,000 (EUR 2,170) and a daily transaction limit of ZAR 1,000. Tyme users will be able to send money to any other cellphone in the country, but only to South Africans as the system requires a South African identity number to be used. Mobile money transfer services are extremely popular in Kenya, where the dominant mobile operator Safaricom, 40%-owned by UK Vodafone, launched in 2007 its M-Pesa service, the pioneer of mobile money worldwide. Since then it has grown tremendously. As of end-June 2012 Kenya had 19.5 million mobile money transfer subscriptions, which accounted for 65.7% of the total number of mobile subscriptions. The total amount of deposits made through mobile phones soared 38.1% y/y to KES 672.3bn (EUR 6bn) in the fiscal year to end-June, according to data from the Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK). Currently, about 80% of all mobile money transactions globally occur in East Africa. |
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