The value of Mobile Money Interoperability (MMI) has increased by 15.7% in October alone.
Macroeconomic and Financial Data from the Bank of Ghana shows that the total value of MMI has increased from GHC679.1 million in September 2020 to GHC785.7 million in October. This shows that mobile money interoperability has increased by GHC106.6 million in October 2020.
Year-on-year analyses show that the value of mobile money interoperability increased by GHC684.1 million from GHC 101.6 million in October 2019. This indicates a year-on-year growth of 673.3% in the value of transactions performed across different networks.
The total number of MMI transactions has also increased from 4.7 million in September 2020 to 5.1 million in October 2020. In October 2019, the number of MMI transactions was 1.3 million. This indicates that the total number of MMI transactions have increased by 3.8 million within the past year.
The value of MMI transactions has been on the rise since December last year with a figure of GHC132.0 million with a total of 1.6 million transactions. As of End-June 2020, the total value of MMI stood at GHC 321.0 million with a total of 3.7 million transactions.
The Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia stated whilst speaking on the Nation Building Updates at the University of Ghana on 26th November 2020 that it cost the government of Ghana $4.5 million to implement the MMI.
“The groundbreaking Mobile Money interoperability (MMI) has also been implemented. The mobile money payments interoperability has made it easy to transfer money across different telcos and between bank accounts and mobile wallets.
“It has also solved the major problem of the over 70% of people not having bank accounts. Today, because of MMI, you can make payments from your mobile money account into any bank account and you can receive payments from any bank account into your mobile money account. You can also receive interest on savings, acquisition of loan (e.g. Qwick Loan) on your mobile wallets”, said Dr. Bawumia.
Data from the Bank of Ghana shows that there are 36.9 million registered mobile money accounts as of October 2020. The total value of mobile transactions has increased from GH¢28.4 billion in October 2019 to GH¢58.0 billion in October 2020. Correspondingly, the total number of mobile transactions has also increased from 188 million in October 2019 to 278 million in October 2020.
This means that within a year, the value of total mobile money transactions has increased by GH¢29.6 billion. The increment represents a 104.2 % growth in the value of transactions in the period under review.
Launched on Thursday 10th May 2018, the Mobile Money Payment Interoperability service allows direct and seamless transfer of funds from one mobile money wallet to another mobile money wallet across networks. The MMI was developed by the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS) with the active collaboration of the Mobile Industry.
The MMI creates convenience for mobile money users to transact business and drives financial inclusion, lowers the cost of the transaction, increases service reach, and reduces reliance on cash for payments. It also provides a financial transaction engine that is versatile, efficient, and robust and enhances patronage by both the banked and unbanked segment of the population.
Before the introduction of MMI, mobile money operators largely operated as closed platforms. Users of one network could not directly transfer money to users of other networks. This required mobile money users to join multiple mobile networks to enable them to send money directly to other users of those networks.
MMI, therefore, enable mobile money users of one network to directly and seamlessly send money to other mobile money users on other networks.
