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Insights and Expertise

How gaming

could boost From mobile games to mobile money

The following are among the insights shared by Kamran
APM adoption Hedjri on factors affecting APM adoption in Africa.

• High mobile money adoption: Mobile money
in Africa platforms are widely used but credit and debit
card adoption remains low.

By Kamran Hedjri • Cash use: Around 90 percent of all payments in
Sub-Saharan Africa are made using cash.
PXP Financial
• Unbanked population: In Sub-Saharan Africa,
round the world, alternative payment methods less than 50 percent of adults have bank ac-
(APMs) are opening up financial avenues for counts.
underbanked populations, and Africa is no
A exception. But while some African countries • Gaming industry growth: Africa's gaming in-
are surging ahead with APM adoption, for many parts dustry is expected to surpass $2 billion by 2024.
of the continent, particularly in rural areas, these services
are still not easily accessible. Can gaming level the play- • Youth market impact: Africa's growing youth
ing field? population is tech-savvy and increasingly in-
volved in mobile gaming, positioning gaming
Across the African continent, it’s very much a tale of two as a critical avenue for APM adoption.
extremes when it comes to how people make payments
and their relationship with money. If we look at Africa
as a whole, mobile money has become a dominant form This is promising not only for gaming developers, but also
of digital payment thanks to the continent’s high mobile for payment platforms looking to reach untapped and un-
phone penetration. Services like M-Pesa in Kenya and banked communities across the continent.
MTN Mobile Money in various West African countries are
now widely used, allowing users to store, send, and re- The African gaming landscape
ceive money using mobile phones. Card payments, includ-
ing debit and credit cards, are also significant, particularly In recent years, Africa has enjoyed increased internet con-
in urban areas. nectivity, higher smartphone adoption rates, and the in-
troduction of high-bandwidth network connections like
But if we isolate the two largest economies in Africa , South 5G, all of which have elevated the region's gaming market
Africa and Nigeria, we see the extent of the disparity in demand. While research suggests that the African gam-
payment trends (see https://bit.ly/3A2rO1U) . South Africa ing industry will surpass $2 billion this year (see https://bit.
has the most developed financial services sector on the ly/3zTz7sN), the actual demand is likely to be much higher.
continent, with 80% of its citizens owning a bank account
and 60% owning cards. Meanwhile, in Nigeria, more than Gamers are a unique type of consumer: they are young,
half of the population is considered unbanked and card tech-savvy and quick to adopt new technologies, includ-
penetration is significantly lower. ing alternative payments methods. Their willingness to
embrace the latest innovations and avoid anything out-
Elsewhere, in Sub-Saharan Africa, researchers have found dated has constantly pushed the gaming industry to stay
that approximately 90 percent of all payments and trans- at the cutting edge. Today, that includes integrating the
actions are made via cash, and adoption rates for credit right mix of payment methods to enhance the player expe-
cards and debit cards are low, 3 percent and 18 percent, rience and create a seamless payment journey. We know
respectively. In this region, less than half of adults (49 per- in developed countries gamers often link their debit and
cent) have a bank account. credit cards to gaming payments, while in areas where
bank accounts and credit cards are less common, digital
While the adoption of APMs varies starkly across Africa, wallets or prepaid cards typically serve as primary pay-
the same cannot be said of gaming. ment methods.

Last year, the global online gaming market generated In Africa, we can see that a young and tech-savvy audi-
around 26.14 billion U.S. dollars in revenues (see https://bit. ence is evidently present, and in the global gamer popula-
ly/48ehLU3) and approximately 1.1 billion online gamers tion, adoption of APMs is proven. This could potentially
worldwide (see https://bit.ly/3A5xTdS), and Africa is gain- be the gateway to introducing APMs in a more consistent
ing momentum. way across the continent. By following the lead of gamers
in adopting APMs, the wider population across African

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