As more institutions are considering ways to connect to the unbanked population of Papua New Guinea, mobile wallets are emerging as a potential game changer for the sector. Charlotte Armstrong examines the key players in PNG’s mobile money market.

BSP’s Mark Robinson and Penelope Aisi launching the Wantok Wallet. Credit: BSP

As Papua New Guinea’s telecommunications rollout speeds up, financial institutions and telcos alike are looking at utilising new technologies to bring payments and other solutions to the unbanked and under-banked population in PNG.

Steven Matainaho, Secretary of the Department of Information and Communications Technology, recently noted that around 4.4 million Papua New Guineans are registered as having a mobile phone.

“We are in a transition from tangible cash to virtual cash.”

The use of ‘mobile wallets’, digital banking services that can be performed through a cell phone, could bring in “up to 50 per cent” of the unbanked into the formal financial sector, Vodafone Chief Strategy Officer Ronald Prasad said at the recent Innovation PNG 2025 conference in Port Moresby.

Mobile wallets allow users to send and receive funds and check their balance using their mobile phone. Different systems have other functionalities, including allowing government and merchant payments as well as overseas transactions.

PNG’s key players

Institutions with banking licenses are covered for digital banking, including mobile banking, according to the Bank of Papua New Guinea. Several banks have already premiered their mobile money offerings.

Kina Bank’s WhatsApp Banking allows users to text instructions to a Kina Bank WhatsApp account, while BSP’s Wantok Wallet uses USSD technology to allow instructions to be texted to the Wantok Wallet without the use of a smart phone.

CreditBank PNG has partnered with software company Entrust to provide digital and credit card payment solutions through its app.

Other banks, including TISA Bank, have a variety of available options for digital banking, ranging from smartphone apps to USSD technology.

BSP’s Wantok Wallet is among the most accessible services, requiring neither a bank account, internet or smartphone to access the service.

Penelope Aisi, project lead of the Wantok Wallet, tells Business Advantage PNG that this vision was part of the product’s creation, and that it was “making digital banking simpler and more accessible for our customers”.

Telcos entering the market

Telcos are also looking to enter the financial services market, with Digicel’s CellMoni having around 1.6 million individual users, which is around 53 per cent of its customer base in PNG.

CellMoni allows users to “experience bank services using a Digicel number”, CEO Tarik Boudiaf said at Innovation PNG 2025.

Plans are already underway for CellMoni to add merchant services, full capability for international transfers, and other key functionalities modelled off success in other markets.

“We are in a transition from tangible cash to virtual cash,” says Boudiaf.

Meanwhile, Vodafone’s M-PAiSA is looking to be approved for use in PNG with the view of aligning available services to match those in the Fiji market, where Prasad predicted FJ$8.56 billion (K16 billion) in mobile money transactions would take place this year.

Economic potential 

Boudiaf and Prasad both spoke at Innovation PNG 2025 about the intent for their platforms to move into other financial services, such as loans, as the telecommunications and the mobile money landscape matures.

Both also noted the potential contribution that mobile money could make to PNG’s economy, with Boudiaf noting that between 2013 and 2022, a 10 percentage point increase in mobile money adoption in sub-Saharan countries contributed to a 0.4 to 1.0 per cent rise in their GDP.

Meanwhile, Prasad said that due to the person-to-government and government-to-person capability of mobile money, there was great potential for the government to raise revenue and gain a clearer picture of the financial state of PNG.

“The opportunity for all operators to grow together in PNG is huge,” said Prasad.