§34
Financial System & Banking
THE THESIS
More than 40% of sub-Saharan African adults have no financial account at all — and Africa's money is priced in dollars, settled in London, and, for fourteen nations, still tied to Paris. The AR builds a continental financial system that serves everyone — and answers to no one but Africans.
Follow an African franc on its journey to another African franc. A trader in Accra paying a supplier in Lagos cannot swap cedis for naira. Her money must first become someone else's money — dollars or euros — travel through a correspondent bank in Europe or America, pay tolls at every step, and wait days for clearance between two cities an hour's flight apart. Multiply her by a continent: an estimated $5 billion a year in tribute, paid by Africans, to move African money between Africans. That is not a banking system. That is a colonial toll road with an app. The AR bulldozes it.
SEE ALSO
§9 The Ask & Capital Deployment · §17 Industrialisation Continental Master Plan · §27 Taxation & Fiscal Policy · §46 Investment Climate, SMEs, the Private Sector, Insurance & Capital Markets