During the second quarter of 2022, subscribers of MTN Uganda and Airtel Uganda received interest payments of 9.1 billion Ugandan shillings (about 2.3 million USD).
Subscribers will receive interest only if their account balance was higher than or equal to 1 shilling at any time between April 1 and June 30. The total amount paid out by MTN Uganda to its 19.8 million MoMo customers was 5.7 billion shillings, while the total amount paid out by Airtel Uganda to its approximately 20 million Airtel Money customers was 3.4 billion shillings.
The first date for payments was September 14.
Read also From Telco to TechCo: MTN Group Announces Two New Executive Appointments
This action conforms to the rules governing mobile money services in Uganda.
In order to comply with Uganda’s National Payments Systems (NPS) Act 2020, MTN Uganda and Airtel Uganda were required to split their mobile phone operations in June 2021.
Additionally, the legislation mandates that payment processing institutions distribute to their customers any interest accruing in a trust account.
The Bank of Uganda reports that in the second quarter of 2021, 3.9 billion mobile money transactions took place, whereas in the second quarter of 2019, the number of transactions reached 4.8 billion. The value of transactions increased by 37% over this time period, from 113.3 billion shillings to 156 billion shillings.
Read also Nigerian Fintech Startup TAP Raises $3M Seed Funding To Expand
“We strongly believe that this quarterly interest paid to customers will encourage a culture of savings and create wealth and investment opportunities, especially in medium and small businesses that are heavy users of the mobile money platform,” said Richard Yego, Managing Director of MTN MoMo Uganda Ltd.
subscribers interest MTN Airtel Uganda
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer, who has several years of experience working in Africa’s burgeoning tech startup industry. He has closed multi-million dollar deals bordering on venture capital, private equity, intellectual property (trademark, patent or design, etc.), mergers and acquisitions, in countries such as in the Delaware, New York, UK, Singapore, British Virgin Islands, South Africa, Nigeria etc. He’s also a corporate governance and cross-border data privacy and tax expert.
As an award-winning writer and researcher, he is passionate about telling the African startup story, and is one of the continent’s pioneers in this regard. You can book a session and speak with him using the link: https://insightsbyexpert