PAPSS Payments Jump 1,000% as Kenya Joins the Network

A Kenyan business paying a supplier in Nigeria has traditionally had to take a detour through the US dollar.

Shillings are converted into dollars. The payment passes through a correspondent bank outside Africa. The supplier receives the dollars and converts them into naira. By the time the money arrives, two currency conversions, bank fees and several working days may have been added to a transaction that started and ended in African currencies.

PAPSS was built to remove that detour.

The Pan-African Payment and Settlement System lets participating banks send payments in local currencies. A Kenyan business can pay in shillings while its Nigerian supplier receives naira, with the currencies settled through the network rather than sending dollars between the two countries.

Now the network is getting much busier.

PAPSS processed about 1,000% more payments over the past year, while the value of those payments increased by roughly 120%, according to figures shared by chief executive Mike Ogbalu III at a media briefing in Lagos this month. PAPSS now operates in more than 30 African countries.

Transaction volume grew roughly 11 times, while transaction value grew about 2.2 times. The average payment is consequently much smaller than it was a year ago.

PAPSS has not disclosed the absolute number of transactions behind the increase, so the 1,000% figure cannot tell us how large the network actually is. It does show that far more payments are passing through the system than they were a year ago.

Nigeria recorded a similar pattern. Payment volume increased by about 1,100%, while the value of those payments rose by roughly 125%.

PAPSS has not broken down who is making those payments, but the mathematics leaves less room for the network's growth to be explained by a handful of larger transfers. More transactions are moving through the system, and they are smaller on average.

That is the part that could eventually bring PAPSS closer to ordinary businesses.

The network was created by the African Export-Import Bank and adopted by the African Union as payment infrastructure for the African Continental Free Trade Area. Instead of requiring banks to settle every African payment through foreign correspondent accounts, PAPSS allows participating central banks to settle the net difference between money flowing in and out.

If $10 million moves into Ghana while $9 million moves in the opposite direction, the system does not need to find dollars for all $19 million of transactions. The central banks settle the $1 million difference.

The rest stays within the participating payment systems.

Afreximbank estimates that sending money across an African border currently costs about 7% to 8% of the amount sent, compared with a global average of 6% to 7%. PAPSS says its system can cut transaction costs by as much as 92% to 95%, reduce processing times by 99.99% and lower foreign-exchange requirements by up to 80%.

Those are PAPSS's figures, and the network has not published the underlying calculations alongside the latest growth numbers. Its stated payment speed is around seven seconds, against a service guarantee of 120 seconds.

Kenya has been moving into that system piece by piece.

The Central Bank of Kenya joined PAPSS in 2023. KCB went live in March 2025, becoming the first Kenyan bank on the network alongside Rwanda's Bank of Kigali.

Then, in February 2026, Pesalink connected to PAPSS.

That connection reaches beyond a single bank. Pesalink links more than 80 Kenyan banks, SACCOs, fintechs and telecommunications companies, giving institutions connected to the switch a route into PAPSS without each one having to build separate connections across the continent.

The destination on the Kenyan side can also be a mobile money wallet.

That changes the shape of the payment. A business in Lagos does not necessarily need the Kenyan recipient to give it a traditional bank account before sending money. The payment can enter Kenya through PAPSS and terminate through the local payment infrastructure that already connects banks and mobile money providers.

A bank still has to put PAPSS into its app or payment service. It has to decide which customers can use it and what they will pay. The underlying network can settle a transaction in seconds, but that does not tell us what a Kenyan customer will be charged or how easily they can access it.

PAPSS has not released Kenyan transaction figures, either. Ogbalu said adoption was rising but did not say how much of the network's growth came from Kenya.

That leaves the most useful Kenyan number still missing: how much money is actually moving through PAPSS from Kenya.

The network expects to reach 38 countries by the end of 2026 and all 54 African countries within five years. It is also targeting connections with payment systems in China and India in 2027.