Business owners are familiar with a trend that typically governs the growth of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.
International businesses typically select the United Arab Emirates (UAE), with Abu Dhabi and Dubai luring travelers from all over who are looking for a regional base to run their MENA-wide operations.
For instance, after outgrowing its initial site in Beirut, Lebanon, the Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) business NymCard intended to create an office in Abu Dhabi. In an interview with PYMNTS, the company’s CEO and founder, Omar Onsi, said that it allowed them to connect with “customers, IT firms, and payment innovators seeking various types of modern payment solutions.”
From Abu Dhabi, where it plans to stay for the long future, NymCard can now easily coordinate its efforts across the MENA region.
“NymCard is not seeking to serve the entire world; instead, we are laser-focused on fixing the MENA concerns. Onsi declared, “You’ll never see us in Asia, Europe, or the US.”
In addition to these two Emirati megacities, the main Arab-speaking economies in the region are the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and Egypt, providing important markets for enterprises to tap into.
Bahrain’s established banking infrastructure and friendly regulatory environment make it a suitable alternative for the FinTech sector. Recently, the little nation has given rise to companies like Tarabut.
A $18.5 million pre-Series B financing was completed by Jordanian peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platform liwwa in order to expand the pool of its retail customers who may finance loans and generate returns while promoting greater financial inclusion in the country.
This illustrates that the inclusion of Jordan’s more than 750,000 registered refugees into the financial system and supporting the growth of the digital economy would both depend heavily on FinTechs.
The three pillars of microfinance, digital financial services, and small- to medium-sized business (SMB) finance are the foundation of the government’s national financial exclusion strategy because it understands the critical role the FinTech sector can play in assisting such marginalized populations.
