ADD.XYZ partners with major Cross-Border Mobile Money Networks and banking providers in Africa to introduce Mobile Money Users to DeFi
In the first ever DeFi solution of its kind, ADD.xyz will enable tens of millions of African Mobile Users to directly access DeFi lending protocols through mobile money.
What is Mobile Money?
Mobile money refers to the payment of money without the use of hard cash through your mobile devices. Airtime payments, bill payments, and remittances are the leading contributors to mobile financial services. Mobile money systems serve a dual purpose of providing an engine for financial inclusion as well as an opportunity for service providers. More than two billion people in 2012 lacked a formal credit or a saving account. Mobile money systems can play a part in reaching such individuals and provide them the ability to manage their wealth with the help of financial inclusion.
The growing pervasiveness of mobile phones is a driving factor in increasing the number of mobile money users and changing the dynamic of digital financial solutions. Out of the 2.3 billion people who did not have access to formal financial services in 2015, 1.7 billion owned mobile phones
How will ADD.xyz bring DeFi to Mobile Money?
As part of sustained ongoing efforts by the ADD.xyz team, ADD.xyz is fulfilling its promise to create bridges between centralised and decentralised finance. In August 2020, ADD.xyz secured a integration and logistical partnership with major MTN and banking providers in Kenya and Nigeria such as the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS) and MTN Nigeria (MTN:JSE), giving our new DeFi Mobile Money technology the exposure to 195 million Nigerians and 51 million Kenyan’s. In the first phase of launch; ADD will be able to accept the Kenyan Shilling and Nigerian Naira.
Mobile Money has been one of the greatest leapfrog technologies of this century, allowing citizens across developing nations to have access to financial services without traditional banking as the infrastructure often doesn’t exist.
Through a partnership with the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS) and MTN Nigeria (MTN:JSE) and other top 10 MTN mobile money providers in Africa, Add.xyz will work in partnership to allow tens of millions of Africans to send local currencies straight into the leading DeFi protocols such as Compound, Dydx, Curve, YFI and other protocols non-lending based DeFi protocols such as Tornado.Cash, Insurance Protocols and NFT’s.
Simply open your Mobile Money App, send to ADD.xyz’s local mobile money accounts, connect to ADD.xyz’s platform using Fortmatic Mobile Sign on and our back-end database’s do the rest by assigning deposits APY using its own liquidity.
Goodbye FX fees & risks!
What is MTN mobile money?
MTN Mobile Money is a secure electronic service that enables MTN Mobile Money wallet holders to store funds, send and receive money, make payments and do a number of other transactions simply using their mobile phone. It’s fast, simple, convenient and affordable. And it’s offered by MTN in partnership with over 10 partner banks, in a number of countries across Africa.
Financial inclusion in East Africa has been significantly impacted by the wide adoption of mobile money services — led by Kenya — but the uptake has been slow in Africa’s two largest economies, Nigeria and South Africa. While South Africa’s more advanced economy often treats mobile money as a “nice to have”, the situation in Nigeria is quite different. There, just 40% of people have bank accounts, so the economy would likely get a boost from the expansion of mobile money services.
According to Statistica, research provided on October 21, 2020, indicates that there are over 1 Billion registered MTN accounts with 17.1 Billion transactions in Sub Saharan African with a value of 456.3 Billion USD in the year of 2019 (Statistica, 2020)
Mobile money is undergoing rapid growth in Africa, driven by improved access to technology, difficulties accessing traditional financial services and an increase in contactless payments related to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Provided by telecommunication companies and supported by a network of licensed agents, mobile money services allow registered users to deposit cash into a virtual wallet, and use those funds for payments and purchases, including peer-to-peer (P2P) payments.
For those with no access to banking services, mobile money provides financial inclusion, a way to participate in the economy without a bank account. This has led to a boom in the use of mobile money in Africa, one of the most underbanked regions in the world. In 2019, 200 million users made 24.46 billion mobile money transactions in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East and Northern Africa, accounting for 64.15 percent of all transactions made worldwide. Of the 690.1 billion U.S. dollars in mobile money transactions made in 2019, 456.3 billion U.S. dollars was exchanged in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Mobile money has become big business for telecommunication providers in Africa. Approximately 144 mobile money providers operate in Sub-Saharan Africa, with two companies such as, M-Pesa, MoMo and Orange Money accounting for a significant share of the market.
M-Pesa, managed by Vodafone and Safaricom and operating in seven countries, has seen significant growth in recent years. The service attracted an additional 12 million users from 2017 to 2020, reaching 41.5 million users by 2020. M-Pesa users made 12.2 billion transactions in 2020, generating 784.36 million U.S. dollars in revenue for parent company Safaricom. MoMo — MTN Group’s mobile money offering — has enjoyed similar growth, reaching 35.1 million active customers in March 2020.
The effect of underbanking on the use of mobile money can be seen in Southern Africa, where banking services are easier to access. Mobile money has gained less of a foothold in that region, suggesting that unless another solution to financial exclusion in parts of Africa is discovered, that the use of mobile money in Africa is set to grow well into the future.
How does MTN Mobile Money work?
MTN Mobile Money stores funds in a secure electronic account linked to an MTN mobile phone number. In Africa, it’s the usual way to pay others, pay bills and make transactions. Add.xyz will utilise Fortmatic, a unique mobile sign on solution for DeFi, allowing users to register, verify and control their DeFi holdings through their mobile numbers.
How does it connect to DeFi?
Users will deposit local currencies into ADD.xyz’s local MTN approved accounts through the main platform. Via ADD’s infrastructure, users will then be assigned to the protocol and amount of currency they wish to deposit into any DeFi lending protocol. Interest will then be paid directly back to the users mobile money account, in a fully decentralised and instant solution. ADD uses its own liquidity within protocols to assign users APY, and charges a small service fee. Over time, ADD will introduce yield farming incentives for other DeFi users to act as liquidity providers, thus increasing the amount of deposits possibly available to African Users.
Mobile money depositors and Liquidity providers assets will always be secure, as they do not leave the local MTN accounts or the lending protocols unless the owner chooses to do so.
Add.xyz, in corporation with some of the largest mobile networks and banks in Africa will expand to Tanzania, Ghana, South Africa, Zambia & Uganda in the second stage of development, further expanding the accepted currencies to the Tanzanian Shilling, Ghanaian Cedi, South African Rand, Zambian Kwacha & Ugandan shilling.
In the Beta-testing phase, over 500 users from Kenya and Nigeria awaiting the testing launch will be able to deposit and withdraw from ADD.xyz’s mobile money solution with up to $50,000 per protocol/per currency available as liquidity; to and from their mobile numbers.
Benefiting our Stakeholders — $ PLT
Service fees and financial revenue will be directed & architected towards the removal of PLT from the network, thus reducing circulation over time. This is the easiest and fairest way that we can envision truly working towards an Ecosystem of Decentralised Financial Services and Tech that benefits our stakeholders that enabled us to build the next generation of Finance. As the boundaries of composability are pushed further, we intend to play a major role in increasing financial participation to individuals who have never used DeFi before.
For any questions please feel free to reach out to us on:
Website: https://add.xyz/
Telegram: https://t.me/ADDXyzpublic
Twitter: https://twitter.com/adddotxyz
Medium: https://medium.com/@Add.xyz
