Nigerian fintech unicorn Flutterwave has secured a Nigerian banking license, strengthening its financial infrastructure in the country and enabling more efficient financial services and settlement flows for consumers, businesses and enterprises.
Launched in 2016, Flutterwave builds modern payments technology and infrastructure for Africa to enable people and businesses to connect with the global economy. Its solution enables banks and merchants to replace multiple payment integrations with one simple API, which enables processing of any form of payment anywhere in Africa. To date, the company has processed over US$40 billion in payments and enabled more than 1 billion unique transactions.
The company is one of Africa’s few tech unicorns, with a valuation exceeding US$3 billion, and it has now secured a Nigerian banking license. The license enables the company to hold funds and deposits directly, strengthening its financial infrastructure and enabling more efficient financial services in its largest market.
Historically, global payment companies have operated via a “sponsorship” model, partnering with established commercial banks to access national clearing and settlement systems. While functional, this arrangement often limits a fintech’s pace of innovation and requires them to share a portion of the transaction value with the sponsoring institution.
By securing this banking license, Flutterwave gains greater control over how funds move within its ecosystem, including the ability to hold deposits and manage financial flows across its platform.
While Flutterwave will continue to work closely with banking partners across the broader financial ecosystem, the license enables the company to internalise key elements of its financial value chain, improving operational efficiency and supporting faster product development. By operating more directly within the regulated financial system, Flutterwave can further optimise how money moves across its platform and improve settlement efficiency across its network of merchants, businesses and consumers.
“This milestone allows us to make our infrastructure more efficient and deliver faster, more reliable financial services,” said Olugbenga Agboola, founder and CEO of Flutterwave. “By operating directly within the financial system, we can streamline money movement, accelerate settlement for merchants, and build products that support sustainable long-term growth.”
