PAYING IT FORWARD

Ashraf Sabry, Cofounder and CEO of Fawry for Banking Technology and Electronic Payments (Fawry), Egypt's largest e-payments network, has had a significant impact on introducing Fintech to the cash-centric country. Despite the backdrop of an economic downturn, he's continuing to ride the digital wave toward banking the unbanked population.

- SAMAR KHOURI

The increasing accessibility of Fintech is having a significant impact on the way people control, spend, and grow their money, in the Middle East and globally. This is particularly true in Egypt, where the level of financial inclusion remains low but is now growing exponentially.

Financial inclusion rates in Egypt grew 131% between 2016 and June 2022, resulting in 39.6 million, or 60.6%, of the eligible population over the age of 16 owning transactional accounts, according to the Central Bank of Egypt. “The number of unbanked Egyptians has decreased a lot,” observes Ashraf Sabry, Cofounder and CEO of Egypt’s largest e-payments company, Fawry. “When you look into the Findex, which is the World Bank database for financial inclusion, you’ll find that the percentage of banked people in Egypt has reached around 37% or 40%, which was 12% six or seven years ago.”

Having been established in 2008, Fawry has been at the forefront of transforming the country’s Fintech ecosystem for nearly 15 years, helping foster an e-payment culture that is changing many people’s lives. It offers electronic banking and financial services through non-traditional channels, serving Egypt’s banked and unbanked populations and providing B2B and B2C digital payments for businesses, including through electronic bill payments and mobile top-ups. The company—which is listed on the Egyptian Stock Exchange—processes over three million transactions daily, with a customer base of approximately 49 million on a monthly basis. At the time of its listing in August 2019, it had a market cap of $275.1 million; by March 2023, this stood at $575.2 million—an increase of nearly 290% in local currency. It posted over 55% year-on-year growth and had total assets worth $259.4 million as of the end of 2022.