In April 2022, Airtel Africa was granted a license to operate as a Payment Services Bank (PSB) in Nigeria, almost four years after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) issued new guidelines for such licenses. Airtel is the second largest telecommunications operator in the West African country by the number of subscribers, according to data from the Nigerian Communications Commission.
The PSB license allows mobile network operators, mobile money providers and retail chains to provide a reduced version of banking services. To obtain this license, which the competitor MTN also won in April, the subsidiaries must, among other things, have a basic capital of 5 billion naira (almost 12 million euros).
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