Peppermint Innovation Ltd (ASX: PIL) (“Peppermint” or “the Company”) is pleased to announce that Peppermint Bizmoto Inc. (PBI), a fully owned subsidiary of the Company, has been granted a license to operate as an Electronic Money Issuer (“EMI”) by the Central Bank of the Philippines, ‘Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ (“BSP”).
The EMI license authorises PBI to deliver e-wallet services through its bizmoto mobile App – allowing any Filipino, not just bizmoto agents, to use the bizmoto platform to receive digital money and access digital services.
The accreditation allows Peppermint and bizmoto users to join the 38.88 million Filipinos that are transacting digitally, following bizmoto’s integration with fund transfers services such as InstaPay and PESONet and with non-banking institutions for cash-in and cash-out services.
The Company will soon start work on a pilot program with a local community to facilitate financial inclusion by encouraging members to become bizmoto users so they can immediately access digital and mobile payments as an alternative to cash transactions within their community.
Peppermint’s Managing Director and CEO Chris Kain said: “The issuance of an EMI licence to PBI will, ultimately, deliver significant value to the Company and the communities we operate in. We’re excited to share the BSP’s vision that 50% of all retail transactions that occur throughout the Philippines are digital by 2023, and that 70% of Filipino adults have formal accounts by 2023,”
Neal Cross, Peppermint Non Executive Director stated: “We have now secured our keystone for the licensing strategy in the Philippines, on top of our previous Finance License enabling lending to micro- entrepreneurs, we can now supply cash in, cash out to an open wallet and deliver micro lending to mass consumers. Basically, we cover most of the features that a bank has at a fraction of the operating cost, enabling us to scale at a greater rate, that can only be good for our end clients and partners.”
Peppermint is privileged to receive an EMI licence for PBI given the BSP’s decision last December to impose a two-year ban on issuing any further non-bank or bank-owned EMIs to ensure a liquidity- strong digital payments sector, giving it a significant advantage in the market.
