Safaricom’s My OneApp handles Sh100bn M-Pesa transactions

Safaricom's My OneApp ecosystem has become a financial throughput powerhouse in East Africa, processing approximately Sh100 billion in daily transaction value—a metric that underscores the company's grip on Kenya's mobile money infrastructure and digital banking future. According to CEO Peter Ndegwa, the platform now orchestrates roughly 500 million transactions per day, with M-Pesa, the operator's flagship remittance and payment service, driving the vast majority of that activity.

This scale positions My OneApp not merely as a payments app, but as a financial spine connecting millions of Kenyans to credit, savings, insurance, and investment services. The sheer transaction density—500 million per day—translates to approximately 5,787 transactions per second at peak, a throughput that few African fintech platforms have achieved.

## How does My OneApp differ from standalone M-Pesa?

M-Pesa alone is a money transfer service. My OneApp wraps M-Pesa inside a broader ecosystem: users can access Safaricom's credit products, insurance (via partnerships), savings features, and merchant payment tools from a single interface. The Sh100bn daily figure reflects all activity within that envelope, not M-Pesa transfers alone. This convergence strategy mirrors global super-app models (WeChat, Alipay) but adapted for Africa's unique payment infrastructure.

The Sh100bn daily volume is particularly significant when contextualized against Kenya's broader financial system. In 2023, the Central Bank of Kenya reported that mobile money transactions exceeded Sh40 trillion annually—roughly Sh110 billion per day. My OneApp's Sh100bn daily suggests Safaricom is capturing nearly 91% of Kenya's mobile money transaction value, a market concentration that raises both opportunity and regulatory scrutiny.

## What drives investor interest in this metric?

For equity investors in Safaricom (traded on NSE and LSE), transaction volume is a leading indicator of revenue growth. Each M-Pesa transaction generates a small fee (typically 0.5–1% for peer-to-peer transfers); at 500 million daily transactions, even a fractional average yield creates substantial recurring revenue. The ecosystem approach also increases customer lifetime value—users who access credit or insurance through My OneApp are stickier and generate higher ARPU (average revenue per user).

For venture and impact investors, the platform's scale demonstrates that Africa's fintech maturity is real. Kenya's mobile money penetration (85%+ of adults) and transaction volumes rival mature markets, yet remain undermonetized relative to wallet share.

## What are the infrastructure risks?

Concentration risk is material. A single outage at My OneApp impacts not just payments, but merchant settlements, remittances, and credit disbursals. Safaricom has invested heavily in redundancy, but systemic fragility increases as the platform becomes more critical to Kenya's financial plumbing. Regulatory bodies (CBK, CA) are also monitoring anti-competitive concerns—Safaricom's dominance leaves little room for rivals like Airtel Money or Equity Bank's Equitel.

The Sh100bn daily figure also masks rural-urban inequality: transaction density is highest in Nairobi and major cities, while rural areas—despite high mobile penetration—remain underserved by the broader ecosystem.

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