The Commercial Bank of Ethiopia recorded a profit of Birr 13 billion and collected Birr 58.7 billion in revenue over the past six months. The bank’s assets reached Birr 1.2 trillion and it opened 55 new branches, bringing its total number to 1,879. CBE also acquired USD 1.7 billion in foreign currency, exceeding its target for the period, and saw an increase in ATM and mobile banking users to 8.8 million and 6 million, respectively. The bank had a profit of Birr 27.5 billion in the 2021/2022 fiscal year.
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Ethiopia: CBE launches remittance app
Commercial Bank of Ethiopia has launched Ethio Direct, a digital remittance app for the Ethiopian diaspora in Canada, Israel, USA, Italy, South Africa, Sweden, UAE, UK, and Saudi Arabia. The service allows users to send dollars to Ethiopia with international payment cards, from $5 to $1,000, and is available for download from the App Store and Play Store.
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CBE expands digital offering
The Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) has signed an agreement with Seregela to collaborate on payment systems, enabling customers to make payments using CBE card, mobile banking, or CBE Birr. They also launched an application that allows users to pay for purchases within a month of the date of purchase. CBE facilitated Birr 2 trillion using its digital channels in the past year and has 1838 branches and 35 million customers, facilitating 20 million transactions per month.
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Wide-ranging interview on financial sector reform in Ethiopia
On entry of foreign banks: Local banks in Ethiopia are worried about competition from foreign banks, but the National Bank of Ethiopia will open the sector gradually, allowing only a limited number of foreign banks and limiting the number of branches and management involvement to protect local banks. The big international banks are not expected to enter the market as the Ethiopian market is considered too small for them. Most of the foreign banks that will enter will be African and all laws and restrictions applied to local banks will also apply to foreign banks which may discourage foreign banks from entering.