The Shareholders of Arifpay Financial Technologies S.C. unanimously passed a resolution to increase the company’s capital to 300 Million ETB in an extraordinary shareholders meeting held last week.
Arifpay is the first payment system operator licensed by the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) with both Point of Sale (POS) and Payment Gateway licenses. In 2021, Arifpay was established as a Share Company, per the Payment System Operators Directive No. ONPS/02/2020 of the NBE with a working capital of 140 Million ETB by 42 founding shareholders, a mix of industry experts and angel investors. In its extraordinary meeting convened on February 11, 2024, chaired by Dr. Zewdineh Beyene Haile, the Shareholders of Arifpay approved a significant move as they decided to increase the company’s capital from 140 million ETB to 300 million ETB.
At the meeting, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Arifpay, Mr. Bernard Laurendeau, explained that the decision to increase the capital of the company is passed at a critical time for the company as it strives to expand its products and anticipates both organic and non-organic business expansions within the few years to come. The CEO stressed that the move is part of the strategy the company defined in 2022 and even more specifically to ensure a smooth transition from Stage I to Stage II in its maturity model. The Board Chairman, Dr. Zewdineh Beyene Haile, for his part stated that the resolution to increase the capital of the company is a testament to the collective confidence of all shareholders, the Board of Directors, and the management in the prospects of Arifpay, and he restated his determination to maintain the success of the company in this highly regulated sector.
Arifpay’s achievement has been the joyous incarnation of the policies carefully crafted by the regulator in the last few years, at a time when the Ethiopian financial services sector is in need to expand to support a rapidly growing economy. With the license to engage in financial services in late 2021, Arifpay secured its commercialization permit from NBE in November 2022- another first for the regulator- to launch its products in December. It won the prestigious African Innovation Award of the Year that same month and year. It is to be recalled that Arifpay launched its first suite of Point of Sale (POS) products in December 2022 and its second product, the online payment gateway, in December 2023, along with a new suite of POS services.
Arifpay has fully adopted International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), evolving in a highly profitable banking sector, a mix of ingredients that position it as a good candidate to be listed on the upcoming Ethiopian Capital Markets.