Finance & economics | Out of the slump

Fintech is booming, despite a weak economy. Can that last?

Some Nigerian investors worry that the excitement is overdone

Phoning it in
|LAGOS

THE BUZZ about fintech in Lagos, the commercial capital of Nigeria, is so loud that even those without access to the internet cannot miss it. Flashing billboards advertising Kuda, a digital bank, loom over traffic jams, and signs for Paga, a mobile-payments company, adorn thousands of corner shops. Investment has been flowing in, too. In March Flutterwave, a digital-payments firm, raised $170m, making it Africa’s latest unicorn (ie, a startup valued at more than $1bn). Interswitch, a payments processor, acquired its horn in 2019 when it sold a 20% stake to Visa, a credit-card company. Last October Stripe, the most valuable private fintech in the West, snapped up Paystack, a Nigerian digital-payments company, for $200m.

This article appeared in the Finance & economics section of the print edition under the headline “Out of the slump”

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