American Express Co. has introduced its inaugural corporate credit card in Nigeria in partnership with local neobank O3 Capital Nigeria Limited, which could potentially improve the availability of dollar transactions in the West African nation.
On Thursday in Lagos, O3 Capital and Amex unveiled their newest product.
The business card has a $10,000 spending cap and provides a 45-day repayment window for overseas transactions.
“The first-ever American Express Business Card in the most populous African country will give us another way to support local businesses with their growth aspirations,” stated Mohammed Badi, President of Global Network Services at Amex, in a statement.
He said, “American Express is excited to continue to strengthen its presence in Nigeria and expand its reach across Africa.”
The spending limits on additional O3 Capital-Amex cards for domestic and personal use will range from $10,000 to $20,000.
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Additionally, according to Badi, Amex intends to increase its presence in Africa from its current 30 countries to 42, citing increased demand for the company’s cards among consumers and small businesses.
Nigeria has long suffered from a lack of local dollars, which has led to the naira’s occasionally severe volatility. Since foreign exchange reforms in the middle of 2023, the naira has lost 65% of its value relative to the US dollar.
In an effort to increase dollar inflows, the Central Bank of Nigeria has been pushing banks to source dollars independently in order to reduce demand constraints.
They can still be difficult to locate. The majority of the country’s lenders have restricted card issuance to wealthy clients and stopped or limited the use of naira credit cards to make payments overseas.
The Chief Executive Officer, O3 Capital Nigeria Limited, Abimbola Pinheiro, said the O3-Amex card “solves the problem of queuing at banks for business travel allowance and the personal travel allowance.
Pinheiro said, “O3 plans to issue 16,000 American Express cards by the end of 2024 and extend the offering to about a million cards over the next five years.
“It also plans to offer them in other markets including Rwanda, Congo and Ghana, where it hopes to issue Amex cards by end-2025.”
