Moniepoint Drives Financial Inclusion With ‘M’ Chatbot

Nigeria-based fintech company, Moniepoint Inc., has launched “M”, the country’s first artificial-intelligence powered chatbot designed to serve the informal economy.

At the same time, the federal government praised Moniepoint for its decade-long efforts to advance financial inclusion and business growth.

Vice President, Kashim Shettima, represented at the launch by the minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Dr Jumoke Oduwole, said: “Millions of Nigerians power commerce daily in ways that are unseen yet indispensable to our economy. This report gives an important window into the challenges and opportunities within the sector.

It provides a stronger foundation for inclusive, evidence-based policymaking.”

She added that: “The Tinubu-led administration places a high priority on the informal sector, which has remained central to Nigeria’s economic resilience. I commend Moniepoint for its decade-long contribution to financial inclusion, supporting millions of informal businesses across Africa.”

Moniepoint said, “M” is built on a cutting-edge large language model and is configured to help users query and understand data on Nigeria’s informal economy in conversational language. It is positioned as a tool for entrepreneurs, policymakers, researchers and journalists.

The company’s managing director of its microfinance bank arm, Babatunde Olofin, explained: “This year’s report dives deeper into unemployment, taxation, savings behaviour, and business operations within the informal economy, and what we’ve found paints a picture of both resilience and fragility.

“The informal economy is not just a tool for survival but a living ecosystem of innovation and adaptation. We are determined to help shape a more inclusive and sustainable Nigeria, not just for today, but for generations yet unborn.”

The most important insight here is the recognition that the informal economy — often viewed as peripheral — is in fact “the pulse” of Nigeria’s enterprise sector. Moniepoint’s release emphasises that the massive sector can migrate from survival mode toward sustainable growth by equipping informal businesses with data and tools.

Moniepoint also used the launch event to mark its 10th anniversary. The company said it now serves over 10 million active businesses and individuals, processes more than 1 billion transactions monthly, and facilitates payments exceeding US$22 billion. It positions this milestone as a signal of the company’s ambition to deepen public-private collaboration and to align with Nigeria’s “Renewed Hope” agenda to become a US$1 trillion economy by 2030.

Founded in 2015 by Tosin Eniolorunda and Felix Ike, Moniepoint has evolved from building banking infrastructure for major banks into the country’s largest business payments platform and merchant acquirer, offering payments, banking, credit, business-tools and cross-border solutions.

The event also brought together government and development-sector stakeholders. Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) Director-General Charles Odii stated, “We are working with our partners and under this administration’s economic agenda to close these gaps with free CAC registration for 250,000 small businesses, a partnership with SEC to list 1,000 SMEs on the capital market, and new shared industrial hubs that make it cheaper to run a business.

Meanwhile, Moniepoint’s strong market credentials lend weight to its initiative. The company has featured on the Financial Times Africa’s Fastest-Growing Companies list, the CNBC global fintech top 300, and has been recognised by the Central Bank of Nigeria as Financially Inclusive Fintech of the Year.

Consequently, Moniepoint rolls out “M”, the chatbot, and deepens its focus on the informal economy. Observers will be watching whether access to data and digital tools catalyses a transformation of Nigeria’s vast informal sector into a more formalised, growth-oriented engine.