Moniepoint enters diaspora remittance space with MonieWorld
Moniepoint's MonieWorld is betting on infrastructure to disrupt the crowded UK-Nigeria remittance market, despite being late to the party.
When Visa pumped over $10 million into Moniepoint earlier this year, we all anticipated a global move. And unfailingly, Moniepoint, a leading Nigerian fintech company, just dropped its newest platform, MonieWorld, for Nigerians living abroad, starting with the UK-Nigeria remittance corridor.
The application seems pretty impressive. You can send money from your MonieWorld account, cards, your UK bank account, or even Apple Pay and Google Pay, straight to any Nigerian bank. They did a live test, and it took just 17 seconds to send £1 to a Moniepoint account, which received ₦2,172 — a few naira higher than competitors like LemFi or Grey.
Even though MonieWorld currently claims to offer the best exchange rate on the market, the idea isn’t just to compete on price. Moniepoint’s real bet is on scale and infrastructure. They've already built the rails: from cards and credit to compliance and software. And now, they’re rerouting that machinery for immigrants. The CEO, Eniolorunda, says MonieWorld’s edge is in being able to offer cheaper services without being cheap, thanks to the scale and tech stack they have refined back home in Nigeria.
Starting first in the UK makes sense, given the numbers. In 2023, remittances leaving the UK totalled over £9.3 billion ($ 12.3 billion), with Nigerians in the diaspora sending over $20 billion back home, according to the World Bank. That's a huge market, and Moniepoint's looking to tap into it.
Of course, the UK-Nigeria remittance market is tough. It's crowded with established players like Send, Nala, Wise, and LemFi, who've built trust and loyalty over the years. But Moniepoint isn't new to the game. It runs a billion-dollar agency banking empire with over a billion transactions monthly, so it knows a thing or two about scaling. And it's not rushing into expansion. Instead, it is focusing on dominating the UK-Nigeria space first. Only when MonieWorld is among the top two providers will it consider launching elsewhere, per the company.
It's a refreshingly patient approach, especially in a sector where many startups rush to expand without a solid foundation. So, while MonieWorld might be late to the party, if Moniepoint’s history is anything to go by, showing up late doesn’t mean showing up small.
