Shameel Joosub, Vodacom Group CEO.

As Vodacom Group advances into fintech, the telco reported today that Vodafone Egypt's financial services revenue soared by 77.7%.

The company said commercial momentum was strong in Egypt, with a 40.7% increase in financial services customers to 10.5 million and a 25.6% improvement in data traffic.

It went on to say with service revenue of R6.8 billion, Egypt now accounts for 22.3% of the Group’s total, closing the quarter with 50.7 million customers, up 6.2%

Vodacom Group continued by saying its mobile money platforms, including Safaricom, processed $437.7 billion in transaction value last year, a 19.1% increase, strengthening its grip in the African fintech sector.

The pan-African telecoms business today gave an update on its performance for the quarter ended December 31, 2024, with Group CEO Shameel Joosub noting that financial services are now Vodacom's golden goose.

“Group financial services revenue was $190 million (R3.6bn) in the quarter, up 5.7% (17, 2%*), reflecting good growth across our segments. In South Africa, financial services growth was supported by our insurance business. In our International business, normalised M-PESA revenue grew 10, 2%*, supported by Tanzania and Lesotho,” Joosub said.

Amounts highlighted with a * denote normalised growth, which presents performance on a comparable basis.

Joosub went to say: “Our advanced financial services such as loans, savings, international money transfer, insurance and merchant services aim to deepen financial inclusion across our markets.

“For the International business segment these advanced services reached 44% of M-PESA revenue in the quarter. In Egypt, financial services revenue was up 77.7%* in local currency, supported by strong customer growth.

“Our financial services strategy is supported by a dual-sided ecosystem across consumers and merchants, bringing these segments together through exceptional and personalised experiences relating to entertainment, e-commerce, payments, and advanced financial services.”

He continued: “As key drivers of this strategy, our super-apps – VodaPay, Vodafone Cash and M-PESA – integrate our own products and services with the best offerings from our partners. In addition to our super-apps, we continue to roll out our agent network to support core mobile financial services products, such as cash-in and cash-out.

“Our agent network across the International business was up 35.1% to 454 000. Our merchant base continued to scale meaningfully in South Africa and across International business. In South Africa, active merchants reached 11 280.

“Our merchant base across our International business increased 38.2% to 470 000. This growth reflects our focus on scaling advanced financial services, such as invoice financing and overdrafts, to deepen financial inclusion and expand our addressable commission pool beyond peer-to-peer payments and withdrawals.”