Africa’s biggest lender by assets is backing OPay Digital Services Ltd. with an estimated $185 million private placement, giving the Nigeria-focused fintech firm institutional muscle as it heads toward a high-stakes New York listing. The deal lands as OPay formally filed registration paperwork on Friday to trade American depositary shares.

Standard Bank Group signed twin agreements covering the equity purchase alongside a high-level governance pact, regulatory filings show. Under the terms, Lungisa Fuzile, head of the South African lender’s operations across the rest of Africa, will join OPay’s board of directors, anchoring an alliance targeting cross-border retail scale.

Standard Bank backs OPay ahead of planned listings

The move sets up a test of investor appetite for African tech at a moment when higher global borrowing costs have chilled initial public offerings. Yet OPay is moving ahead with plans to list on the New York Stock Exchange, backed by Citigroup and Deutsche Bank.

Under the filing terms, Standard Bank’s ultimate equity stake will stay capped at 4.99 percent. The final cash payout and equity split remain subject to currency volatility before closing, while a companion memorandum outlines plans to partner on foreign exchange, merchant acquiring services, and wealth product distribution across major African trade corridors.

Profit margins jump sharply

OPay’s prospectus showed bottom-line expansion that outpaced broader emerging-market fintech peers during the first half of the year. Net income climbed to $90.9 million for the six months ended June 30, up from $21.7 million a year earlier, as digital transaction volumes surged across its core network.

Top-line revenue more than doubled during the same window, jumping to $467.1 million from $197.5 million. That operational surge reflects heavy usage in Nigeria, alongside expanding payment processing and lending footprints in Pakistan, Egypt, and Indonesia, where smartphone-based transfers are rapidly supplanting cash transactions for merchants and consumers.

Dual listing on horizon

Founded by Chinese billionaire Yahui Zhou, the creator of Beijing Kunlun Tech Co., OPay previously achieved a $2 billion valuation after a $400 million funding round in 2021. Early backer SoftBank Group Corp. still holds a 6.6 percent equity stake heading into the public float, according to the prospectus.

OPay does not plan to limit its market footprint to Wall Street. The payments operator confirmed it intends to pursue a secondary listing on the Nigerian Exchange once the New York debut is wrapped up, creating a rare dual-market bridge between American institutional capital and domestic local-currency traders.