Key takeaways:
- With over five hundred thousand agents, OPay has the largest agent network in Nigeria.
- According to the Nigerian Financial Services Market report, Moniepoint comes in close with over three hundred thousand agents.
- Lagos has the most agents, accounting for 29% of all agency banking networks in Nigeria.
According to the Nigerian Financial Services Report, agency banking (point of sale [PoS] and mobile money) is one of the major ways people without bank accounts in Nigeria get money from people outside their community. This means PoS agents could be a major driver of financial inclusion in the country.
Which companies have the most PoS agents or agency banking networks?
OPay
At 563,252, Chinese-owned fintech, OPay has the most PoS agents in Nigeria.
In the report, nine financial institutions were highlighted as having a total of 1.1 million agency banking networks across the country, meaning OPay has a 50% share.
Moniepoint
Moniepoint has the second-highest agency banking network at 303,946 — 27.27%.
First Bank
First Bank has 160,740 PoS agents in the country, giving it a 14.42% share of the total number of PoS agents in the country.
Quickteller
At 35,490 PoS agents, Quickteller ranks fourth as the company with the most PoS agents in the country. This means it has a 3.1% share of total agency banking networks in the country.
Access Bank
Access Bank is fifth with 26,013 PoS agents in Nigeria, — 2.33%.
Ecobank
Ecobank has 18,879 PoS agents in the country — 1.7%.
Union Bank
Union Bank has 2,936 PoS agents representing 0.2% of the total agency banking networks in the country.
First City Monument Bank (FCMB)
Second to last on the list is FCMB with 2,028 agents — 0.2%.
Keystone Bank
Keystone Bank has 1,163 — 0.1%.
It is important to note, however, that not all companies that run agency banking networks in the country were accounted for and one agent could use multiple companies.
Yinka Awosanya, the Lead Researcher for the report said, not all companies shared their numbers, and of the ones that did, only figures authorised by the companies were used.
The report which interviewed over 4,600 Nigerians also revealed 77% of Nigerians who do not have bank accounts or mobile money accounts have used a PoS or mobile money agent.
In fact, “there is no financial institution in my area” was the leading cause of why many of them did not have bank accounts. With the accessibility of agency banking to people without bank accounts, agency banking is a key factor in promoting financial inclusion.
