Despite the African Continental Free Trade Area’s (AfCFTA) promise to unify Africa’s trade and payments landscape, financial institutions still see “limited” impact. Yet, on a panel at the Africa Financial Summit in Casablanca on Tuesday, leaders behind the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS) and African Exchanges Linkage Project (AELP) argued that new infrastructure could unlock long-awaited momentum if regulators and banks align.
The AfCFTA, established in 2018 and operational since January 1, 2021, was meant to transform how money and markets move across Africa. Its partners, PAPSS, launched in January 2022 to enable payments in local currencies, and AELP, introduced around 2019 to link stock exchanges across the continent, were built to make that promise real. But five years in, their impact has been underwhelming.
A new Deloitte–AFIS Barometer shows that only 18% of African financial executives expect “transformational impact” from these initiatives, while most predict merely “limited” progress. Behind the scepticism lie familiar concerns: regulatory fragmentation, weak digital infrastructure, and the volatility of local currencies that few banks are willing to trade without hedging.
Read more: https://techcabal.com/2025/11/05/unifiying-africa-trade-and-payments/
