rewrite this title Cross-Border Payments Fintech Flutterwave Acquires Open Banking Firm Mono – Finovate

Flutterwave has agreed to acquire Mono, bringing open banking capabilities fully in-house as it pushes toward a more interoperable financial infrastructure across Africa.

The deal allows Flutterwave to natively integrate financial data access, identity verification, and account-to-account payments.

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Cross-border payments company Flutterwave revealed it has agreed to acquire Mono, a fellow Africa-based fintech focused on providing open banking tools. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

For Flutterwave, investing in open banking technologies shows that it is committed to building an interoperable financial system for Africa. While Flutterwave originally partnered with Mono in 2022, the acquisition will allow the company to fully integrate Mono’s API-driven open banking elements. The native integration will offer users secure access to financial data, identity verification, and account-to-account payments. It will also create a clear path for expanding into richer alternative payment methods, authenticated payment flows, and open banking-enabled stablecoin use cases.

“This acquisition reflects how we think about the future of financial infrastructure in Africa,” said Flutterwave Founder and CEO Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola. “Payments, data, and trust cannot exist in silos. Open banking provides the connective tissue, and Mono has built critical infrastructure in this space. This acquisition allows us to expand what’s possible for businesses operating across African markets, while staying grounded in security, compliance, and local relevance.”

Mono was founded in 2020 to provide financial data, identity verification, and direct bank payments for businesses. With five million linked accounts across more than 500 banks and fintechs, the Lagos-based fintech covers three different countries.

“Mono’s capabilities across financial data access, direct bank payments, and identity verification, combined with Flutterwave’s unmatched scale and global reach, create something more defensible and comprehensive,” said Mono Founder and CEO Abdulhamid Hassan. “This acquisition allows us to build the infrastructure layer that powers the next generation of African fintech at the speed and scale the continent deserves.”

Once the acquisition is finalized, Mono will continue to operate independently with its leadership structure intact. Mono will also retain operational control, which will allow it to maintain its pace of innovation.

Flutterwave accepts payments in more than 30 currencies, processing an average of 500,000 payments each day. In addition to its payments technology, Flutterwave also offers invoicing technology, business loans, and analytics tools. Since it was founded in 2016, Flutterwave has raised more than $470 million and has processed over one billion transactions in excess of $40 billion.

The move positions Flutterwave toward full-stack financial infrastructure. It also reflects a broader industry shift toward open banking–enabled payment flows, where verified data and authenticated transfers reduce fraud, improve conversion, and unlock new use cases. For Africa’s fragmented financial ecosystem, tighter integration between payments and data infrastructure has the potential to boost interoperability while giving cross-border payment players like Flutterwave greater control over compliance, reliability, and product velocity.

Photo by Muhammad-Taha Ibrahim

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