Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today to discuss MTN Ghana's Third Quarter Results for the period ended 30th September 2023. I'm Jeremy Opoku, Investor Relations Manager for MTN Ghana. With me on the call today are Selorm Adadevoh, CEO of MTN Ghana, and Antoinette Kwofie, CFO of MTN Ghana. Selorm will give us an overview of the company's performance for the nine-month period and outlook before we move on to the Q&A session. Please note that this call is scheduled for one hour only. I'll now hand over to Selorm. Your platform, sir.
Thank you, Jeremy. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for making time. Thank you for making time to join us on this call this afternoon to discuss our performance for the period ended 30th September 2023. I will speak briefly about our Q3 results and other related issues, and I will touch on our expectations for the last quarter of the year before moving on to Q&A. In the third quarter of 2023, inflation remains high, although it declined in the last two months of the quarter. September inflation was 38.1%, down from June inflation of 42.5%. This resulted in an average inflation of 44.3% for the nine-month period in 2023. The cedi remained relatively stable in the third quarter, reaching a year-to-date depreciation of 29.7% against the US dollar.
This was largely due to the debt moratorium from the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme and International Monetary Fund's balance of payment support to the Ghana government. In navigating through these macroeconomic challenges, MTN Ghana continued to pursue its Ambition 2025 strategy with a dedicated focus on revenue growth and cost efficiencies. MTN Ghana contributed to the revenue mobilization effort of government through the payment of GHS 4 billion in direct and indirect taxes as well as GHS 313 million in fees, levies, and other payments to governmental agencies for the nine-month period ending September 2023.
As part of our social investments, we awarded scholarships to 120 students to acquire science, technology, and engineering skills to help drive Ghana's digital agenda at a cost of GHS 13.5 million and made considerable progress on the STEM robotics lab for the Mamfe Girls School, as well as a 60-bed maternity and neonatal center for the Keta Municipal Hospital. These are all expected to be completed by the year-end. Our commitment to socioeconomic development continues to be a priority, and we look forward to continue to play our part in Ghana's sustainable development. Turning to MTN's operational performance for the period. In the third quarter, MTN Ghana continued its execution of Ambition 2025 and investments in CapEx to expand network capacity and coverage and also improve service quality and delivery.
These initiatives supported growth in voice, data, and MoMo, which resulted in a 36% year-on-year increase in service revenue. We invested GHS 2.9 billion in CapEx and rolled out 193 2G sites, 196 3G sites, and 193 4G sites, reaching a total of 4,455 4G sites nationwide, with 4G plus coverage at 99.3%. The CapEx spend for the period was double of what was spent in the same period of the prior year due to acceleration of CapEx plan execution, the purchase of license, and inflation-induced escalations on tower lease agreements. These investments and improvements in service delivery and coverage supported the growth in voice revenue, which was 14.5% year-on-year and a total number of GHS 2.7 billion.
Our subscriber base decreased by 9.3% on a year-on-year basis to 25.8 million due to the impact of the SIM re-registration program. Data revenue grew by 47.6% on a year-on-year basis to GHS 4.1 billion, and this was attributable to an increase in the number of active users and continued increases in usage and consumption on an MB basis per active user per month. MoMo money revenue increased by 51.6% on a year-on-year basis to GHS 2.1 billion, resulting from growth in cash out revenue, an increase in advanced services revenue, and growth in P2P revenue. Digital revenue decreased by 15% on a year-on-year basis to GHS 96.3 million. However, we have observed a positive turnaround in the third quarter and expect it to continue through Q4 and beyond.
Improvements made to our MyMTN app, our music and gaming offerings helped grow active digital subscribers by 15.9% on a year-on-year basis to 3.9 million active subscribers. EBITDA increased by 32.6% on a year-on-year basis to GHS 5.4 billion, with a margin decline of 1.5 percentage points to 56.0% due to the impact of elevated inflation largely. We'll continue to execute our expense efficiency program to reduce the full exposure of the current macroeconomic challenges on the business as we continue through the year. Profit after tax grew by 32% on a year-on-year basis to GHS 2.8 billion for the 9-month period ending September 30, 2023. I will now look at some regulatory developments and updates, starting with the SIM re-registration exercise.
MTN Ghana, in compliance with the SIM re-registration directive from the NCA, the National Communications Authority, blocked 5.4 million SIMs that were not registered with a Ghana Card as of May 31, 2023. Since then, 0.6 million SIMs have been re-registered, bringing a total number of outstanding disconnected SIMs to 4.9 million at the end of September. The SIM registration exercise has now been concluded. However, MTN Ghana will continue to work to ensure that all customers that require re-registration have support to seamlessly complete this exercise through our service centers nationwide. To update you on the localization of Scancom PLC and MobileMoney Limited, we're making good progress on the localization of both entities.
Following the scrip dividend issued in Q2 2023, which resulted in a localization movement from 25% to 23.2%, we have since achieved an additional 0.9% ownership in Scancom PLC in Q3 2023, bringing a total reported localization to 24.1%. We will continue to prioritize the localization agenda and work with the relevant regulators and stakeholders to achieve the localization targets. Turning to our outlook. We remain cautious about the outlook for the rest of the year in view of elevated inflationary pressures. Although, we're hopeful that the decreasing trend recorded in the latter part of the third quarter will continue throughout Q4. However, there are some ongoing risks, including geopolitical developments, the potential for further increases in utility tariffs from 1st September 2023, and IMF program reforms such as subsidy removals, amongst others.
Against this backdrop, MTN Ghana will continue to preserve liquidity, strengthen the balance sheet, and explore cost mitigation initiatives through its expense efficiency program. MTN will deploy prudent commercial initiatives that support business sustainability in the short to medium term. Having considered the prevalent and potential impact of high inflation, Ghana's debt sustainability and potential currency volatility, MTN Ghana will maintain its guidance of high 20s growth in percentage terms in service revenue. Thank you for your time and attention, and I will now hand over to Jeremy for Q&A.
Thank you, Selorm. I'll now read our first question. A question on data usage. MB consumed per active user per month was up 36% year-over-year and appears to be accelerating compared to earlier periods. Can you provide some color as to which segments are driving this or it's across the board?
Thanks for your question, Jeremy. It's really across the board. We've seen, since the SIM re-registration, we've seen a rationalization of smartphones on the network and a consolidation of SIMs, and therefore, we're seeing a slightly higher MB per user per month as a result of part of that consolidation across the board, but also an increase in demand for digital services in general.
Thank you. Okay, for the next question. Hello and congrats on the results. I have two questions to start with. The first, why has FinTech contribution to service revenue in the quarter declined? We are in the third quarter of the year with service revenue growth for the nine-month period at 36%. Why are you still maintaining your high twenties service revenue growth guidance? Are you expecting a very slow fourth quarter, and if so, why?
Okay, thanks for your question. Let me start with the guidance. The guidance is a medium-term guidance and covers multiple years. Therefore, it won't be prudent for us to change it on a quarterly basis. This guidance, you know, as stated, is a medium-term guidance and hence why we maintain our high 20s. We're not expecting a significant slowdown in Q4, and we expect the business momentum to continue through the remainder of the year. In terms of the FinTech revenue and its contribution to total revenue, I think it's fair to say the contribution overall has been robust. If you look at the FinTech growth of 51%+, and we're seeing very robust growth on the FinTech side, and we'll continue to see improvements in this contribution to revenue.
However, other parts of the business that are much larger in absolute terms have grown a little bit more. Data, in particular, has been the largest contributor of close to 50% of the year-on-year growth, and then that's why you're seeing that supposed distortion. However, we see FinTech as the primary driver of continued growth in the short to medium term and no change, you know, to the plans that we have in mind. Thanks.
Okay. Next question. How are you finding dollar liquidity in Ghana for CapEx spending and dividend payouts?
Antoinette, do you want to take that?
Yes, I will. Typically we plan our CapEx in advance, and we do use Letters of Credit, which therefore gives us quite a bit of time to mobilize the USD liquidity for delivery. We use 91, 182 day LCs. After we have committed and placed the order, it takes us a while, and we are able to mop up liquidity in the intervening period with the support of our banks to be able to pay by the time it is due.
Thank you, Antoinette. I think I have similar questions, so I'm gonna merge and think it's about. Are you able to increase prices in line or with need of, I mean, looking at the current inflation, and is there any regulatory issues with increasing prices?
Thanks for the question. We are not able to increase prices in line with inflation, but we're able to partially offset the total inflationary pressure on the business. You may recall that earlier this year in February, we had a price increase of approximately 15% on the data side, we're currently in discussions with the regulator for another price increase following some price increases that have happened in the industry from non-SMP operators. We're hopeful that in the next week to two weeks, we'll be able to share more detail on that.
Okay. Thank you, Selorm. The next question, do your tower contracts have power pass-through pricing, or is there a USD component which is expected to head into full year 2024? How do your tower contracts work?
Antoinette, do you want to take it?
Yes, I will. Thanks for the question. We have different types of tower contracts, but I must first say that most of our tower contracts are denominated in cedis, and we do have pass-through, we have pass-through clauses in a number of our tower contracts. We get the, any utility and utility tariff increases, et cetera, gets passed on to us in the next quarter. That's how the pass-through contracts work. We do, we have a very small dollar component, we don't foresee this impacting as forex impacting us significantly on the tower contracts going forward. What does impact our tower contracts, though, is CPI, because we have CPI clauses, on an annual basis, our tower contracts gets inflated by the CPI factor.
That is what usually impacts our tower contracts. Hopefully, that answers your question.
Yes, it does. Thank you, Antoinette. The next question, what is the status of the competition? Are they gaining market share at all, or are they investing in their network?
We don't have enough information to comment on the second part. We do see some signs of investment. For example, there was an announcement in the papers that Vodafone was intending forging an additional 300 sites. That will suggest that there is some investment in the network, which is positive for the industry. Today there is a gap between supply and demand, we estimate that that gap is, you know, quite significant and hundreds of millions of GHS per year of underinvestment in capacity. You know, the fact that, you know, we're seeing some investments from other operators is positive for the industry because that shortfall and the pressure on the networks overall from a quality of service and customer experience standpoint will be alleviated somewhat.
That doesn't take away the opportunity for growth within these segments as well. Thanks.
Thank you, Selorm. Next question, can you give an outlook on subscription growth, Q4 and beyond, and also give more color on effects of hyperinflation on your numbers?
Okay. I'll have Antoinette answer the hyperinflation. Certainly on subscription growth, I'm not quite sure what subscription refers to here, if you don't mind clarifying, please.
I think maybe it's, it has to do with the subscriber base decline and what the, plan is to grow back, what, the decline. I guess maybe reversing it.
Thank you. I think the expectation wouldn't be to go back to the levels that we had. Remember, our subscriber growth was predicated on very, very active and frequent SIM registrations. There was a cycling of SIMs for very short periods of time as a result of the SIM registration regime that existed at the time. That frequency would have changed based on the use of the Ghana Card, so we can't expect to go back to the same levels. However, we should consider this a total reset of the subscriber base. For us, we're starting off at 25.8. We're seeing very healthy net additions, but certainly not at the levels of net additions that we saw before.
We believe that these levels are very healthy, and we'll continue to see overall growth in the market as a result of this, but certainly not going back to the levels that we had before. Thanks.
Great. Thanks. Thanks so much, Selorm.
Thank you. Thank you, Jeremy. I'll touch briefly on hyperinflation. Currently, we do not have a view of the exact impact of hyperinflation on our numbers. We are going through a process to assess what the impact will be, and we will keep the market updated once we are clear on this. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks, Antoinette. Next question. Do you see CapEx intensity reducing any time in the medium term?
We do. I mean, this is a primary objective for us as a business and, you know, as usual, we balance this with the opportunity for growth within the marketplace. Our primary objective is to continue to be efficient, deploy smart CapEx, smart CapEx strategies to reduce the overall medium-term CapEx intensity.
Thanks, Selorm. Next question is, in terms of capacity constraints on data growth, is this all spectrum? When will this start showing up in slowing data growth if you don't get more spectrum? Maybe a follow-up. How receptive is the government to the request to increase spectrum? Will this increase your dominance?
Okay. There are a variety of ways to increase capacity. Obviously, spectrum is one of the most efficient ways of increasing capacity, and the discussions around spectrum will continue. From the recent acquisitions in the industry, I'm talking a few years back, some players have a disproportionately higher spectrum allocation or ownership than we do based on our market share. However, we need to look at the full option set that's available to us, with spectrum being one instrument, pricing being a second, and then, of course, other technological solutions that can increase capacity, either on the radio access network side or in the transmission side or in the core network to allow us to continue to grow.
As a business and as a management team, we, you know, we make assumptions around availability of the different types of resources, and that informs our execution strategy. I mean, we're confident for the short to medium term that we can continue to see the types of growth that we're seeing based on the strategies that we're deploying currently to manage our capacity and our network. Thanks.
Thank you, Selorm. As a bit of a, I think, a follow-up, what kind of CapEx do you need in deploying in the future to cater for the growing volume in data demand? How much more data can the network currently handle? What is happening to prices per GB? Should we expect a flat data RPU in the future?
Okay. I think part of my response before covers a portion of this, where we look at, you know, we look at different ways to get capacity into the network. I also mentioned earlier that we are in discussions with the regulator on prices and reviewing our prices based on price changes that have happened in the market for some of the non-SMP players. Overall, I mean, the question on how much more capacity exists depends on these same variables. You know, I think it would be wrong to suggest a particular answer because a lot of things will be changing. Based on that, we do our capacity planning for next year.
What I can say is we're confident that we can meet the demand for capacity in the short term and based on the strategies that we are deploying. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. Next question. What is the growth trajectory of interconnect given the national roaming strategy? Finally, are you able to increase the interconnect rate since you cut it by 30% in October 2020 as a result of SMP?
Thanks for the question. As a result of SMP, just for everyone's purpose, we're required to reduce our interconnect, our asymmetric interconnect rate by 30%. The initial term of that reduction was two years, which ended in September, but that has been extended for a further 12 months. We have one more year, at which point it will be reviewed again. For now, I mean, it's fair to assume that for the next 12 months. Well, it's not fair to assume. For the next 12 months, we would still maintain the 30% reduction in asymmetric interconnect rate. Thanks.
Thank you, Selorm. Next question. Why was the value of MoMo float down from Q2 despite the revenue growing so quickly?
Thanks for the question. We saw the decrease in MoMo float following the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme. Some of the banks that held funds in MoMo float reduced those funds as a result of the restructuring. That's where that reduction is coming from. If you look at the subscriber wallet float, it actually went up over the period. Thanks.
Thanks, Selorm. Are you able to shed some light on the impact of the national roaming pilot project on MTN's infrastructure? Should we expect some more revenues from that? Any update on when you're getting 5G?
Yeah. The national roaming program has continued to progress, but I would say at a slower rate than we would like. The impact hasn't been too significant as at this point. In terms of the next steps forward, we're looking to formalize commercial terms with both Telecel Ghana and AT Ghana. The outcome of that we expect to be an increase in traffic from both participants, but also increased traffic on our network overall. In terms of 5G, we at this point, we don't have any updates specifically. I'm hopeful that in the next update we'll have some developments on that side. At this point, we don't have any more to share on 5G. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. Next question. Have the power supply issues affected your operations, and how bad is the situation currently?
Can you just repeat the question? I didn't quite understand that. Tower supply issues.
I think the question is asking. I think it's more on the ECG power interruptions and its impact on the operations of the company.
Oh, okay. Antoinette, do you want to take that? Sorry, I heard tower instead of power. Apologies.
Thank you for your question. In terms of power supply, there haven't been significant power supply issues that has had an ongoing impact on our operations. We do have backup power. We have quite a lot of backup power in terms of generators. We have solar on some towers. We haven't seen a significant impact on our operations from power supply issues.
Thank you, Antoinette. The next question, should we expect scrip dividends to be a normal part of dividend payments going forward? Similarly, should we expect share buybacks to be a part of return to shareholders soon?
Antoinette, do you want to take that?
Yeah, Selorm. Scrip dividend, as you know, was an intervention that was put in place to solve a particular issue at a particular point in time. We did say at the time that it was a one-off exercise, but we will continue to evaluate what options exist to solve the challenges we face in our dividend repatriation amongst others. Should there be a need for a scrip dividend, we will declare the same to the market in the future. At this point in time, I am not in a position to say we will have another scrip dividend, but we will evaluate the options, and we will let our investors and shareholders know. Thank you.
Okay. I think, there was a second part on whether you have plans to do share buybacks.
Not at the moment. We have no plans currently to do share buybacks. Thank you.
Thank you, Antoinette. Next question. Can you provide some color on broadband or fixed wireless market in Ghana?
Yes. Let me attempt to give some color on this. You know, the fixed and broadband market overall is still quite young and emerging, and we see significant opportunity in that segment. You know, albeit requiring, you know, quite a significant level of investment in terms of fiber infrastructure in general. On the fixed wireless side, you know, because of the level of consumption or usage from an MB standpoint, also requiring significant capacity on the mobile side. For us, from a strategic standpoint, we see this as a significant growth opportunity for the medium term for the business, and this is part of our forward-looking strategy to grow the data and the connectivity side of the business into the future.
We'll continue to explore efficient ways to be able to tap into this segment, with a more productive use of funds, CapEx, for example, as we invest in this space. You know, we see it as a massive opportunity for the market. Thanks.
Thanks, Selorm. Next question. Can you provide details on volume and value of transactions for MoMo in Q3 and year to date?
Thank you for the question, Jeremy. I'm going to provide a breakdown of the MoMo revenue by contribution. In terms of advanced services. Advanced services contributed about 24% of MoMo revenues for the third quarter. P2P contributed about 24.2%, and cash out contributed about 51.4%. Does that answer the question, Jeremy?
Yes. There was a section asking about value and volume of MoMo transactions.
Okay. Okay. I will get back to you shortly with the numbers. Thank you.
Thanks. Thanks, Antoinette. Okay, next question. When e-Levy was introduced, you subsequently cut fees on P2P transactions by 25%. Is that a sign you don't have the pricing power in Mobile Money despite your size in this space?
We did make a decision in Mobile Money to reduce our fees by 25% for two reasons. The first reason was we expected the increase in overall burden on customers from the e-Levy implementation to be so significant that it would have a huge impact on transactional behavior of customers. This reduction was to try to cushion customers to a certain degree. The second reason was, in the short term, to try to stimulate continued activity. Because rebuilding a transactional base after an implementation such as e-Levy is quite a costly exercise. Therefore, strategically, that allowed us to retain a certain level of transactional activity, which meant post-revisions to e-Levy, the acceleration of growth will be a lot quicker, but also a lot easier and cheaper for the business. These are the reasons we did this.
I don't believe that this suggests, you know, we don't have pricing power in the industry. I do think we need to look at the overall industry dynamics to make the best decisions for continuing to grow the business on a unit basis. You know, these inputs inform our strategy on how we think about pricing. It really is not about pricing power. It's more about strategic decisions to drive growth in the business in the short to medium term, and to keep the business viable and sustainable.
Thanks, Selorm. Next question.
Sorry, Jeremy.
Sure, Antoinette. It's fine.
Just before you go to the next question. Yes. I wanted to provide. In terms of transacted volume, year-to-date, we saw a 38.2% year-on-year growth in the transaction volumes of MoMo, and we saw an 82.6% growth in the transaction values of MoMo. For the year-to-date, we saw transacted values in regions of about GHS 1.3 trillion. Just to answer that question. Thank you.
Thanks, Antoinette, for that information. The next question is, what is driving growth in advanced services? What are the accounting impacts if Ghana is classified as a... Okay, I think, that has been, this, I think addressed by Antoinette. The next question is, as part of that is, are there any developments with SMP? I think the question is growth drivers for advanced services and developments in SMP.
Just very quickly, the growth drivers for advanced services are largely lending products. We've seen quite a good robust increase in lending. We've also seen solid growth in MoMo payments. The payments ecosystem is probably one of the largest immediate opportunities for advanced services. We've also seen some good growth on the remittance side, which supports the overall growth in advanced services. As far as developments in SMP, in terms of new directives or new remedies, we've had no new remedies introduced. As you can expect that the compliance and management of SMP is a continuous process, and we've continued to have interactions and discussions with the regulator through the quarter. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. I think our final question in the pool is, what percentage of your towers have fiber?
We'll have to take that offline. We don't have that number handy. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you, Selorm. Finally, there are currently no questions. I would like to refresh. Give me a sec. Okay, next question. Is MTN Ghana ever getting a microfinance or banking license?
At this point, we have no immediate plans to get a banking license of any sort. In the event that this becomes a strategic objective. We will be sure to advise our investors as well. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. I think next question. What are your top priorities for next year?
Just to start off, I mean, there are two primary objectives for us for next year. We expect the environment to continue to be tough. As you can imagine, the economic, the macroeconomic environment, inflation, forex devaluation. We also expect, being an election year, a little bit of unpredictability and uncertainty. As a result, our first objective is to make sure we continue to manage our cost basis in an efficient manner to preserve our balance sheet, but also to preserve our P&L from a cost spend perspective. Secondly, we also expect to invest strategically to drive growth in the business. We see the growth areas to be, one, data, Mobile Money being the second, and of course, digital services.
We need to continue to drive the turnaround that we talked about so that we can deliver revenue at a much lower cost per revenue generated, and digital services allows us to do that. These would be the three priorities at a top level, while we prepare to ensure that our platform strategy execution continues in preparation for 2025. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. Next question is, what is the status of lending and remittances as part of advanced services? What take rate do you get from lending? Finally, do you expect remittances to be a big driver for Mobile Money?
On the first question on take rates, you know, I think let me just explain the business model because it would explain why we can't give a take rate. First of all, a take rate, from the way I understand it, would assume that there is, you know, a request for a loan and then x, or there's an offer for a loan, apologies, not a request. There's an offer for a loan, specific customers take up this loan offer, and we estimate how many took up the loan versus how many were offered the loan. Now, unfortunately, our business model doesn't work that way. What we do is we base our decision-making on a credit scoring algorithm that determines eligibility to request for a loan.
You can only request for a loan if you are deemed eligible, which would mean that most people who would request for a loan to come through the system would have had to be cleared as eligible, and based on that, the loan will be issued. It's a pre-approved loan, and therefore, from that perspective, you would see very high take-up rates. I'm explaining the business model because that number may be a little bit deceptive because it's a slightly different take-up rate versus what is ordinarily known and used. I hope that clarifies that. Thank you. I guess the second question was how significant would remittance be as a group driving advanced services into the future? The response to that is it is a very strategic, you know, segment or line of revenue for us as part of advanced services.
We see significant growth potential in that space, and we've actually revamped our remittance offer and commercial proposition to put us in a better position to be a more significant participant in that segment of revenue generation. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. I think I'm gonna merge two questions, and it's: Is there any deadline to complete the localization program of MTN Ghana shares? I think it's more to Mobile Money as well. I think it's for both Scancom PLC and Mobile Money.
Yes. The deadline we're currently working towards is December 31st, 2023. As you know, until this year started, some of the variables that we've had to contend with, the DDEP, the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme, macroeconomic factors have continued to be at play, which have meant that the environment and depth of liquidity have also been less than ideal. We continue to put in the requisite effort to meet that deadline. However, the reality of the environment is it has been tough to continue to drive the localization at the levels that we would have preferred. Finally, considering we, you know, the decision to offer scrip dividends as an option in Q2, that also had a reversal implication on the levels of localization attained.
Notwithstanding that, our advisors and our team continue to put in all the effort to achieve as high localization as we can over the next six- eight weeks before the end of the year. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. Is there any update on universal access license and home broadband growth? I think the broadband growth has been addressed. Is there any update on universal access license?
Yeah. On universal access license, I'm guessing the question is as it pertains to MTN. For everyone's purpose, universal access license regime was finally passed by the end of quarter two. MTN was excluded as a result of our significant market power status. The other operators in the telecoms industry have been assigned universal access license, and we're seeing some of the activities on the ground actually as a result of that. At this stage, there's no indication of when MTN will be allowed or will be granted universal access license. The discussions and the engagements with the regulator continue, especially since there is a gap between supply and demand from a capacity standpoint.
Instruments like universal access license have a significant role to play in improving customer experience, quality of service, and continued growth in the industry. These engagements will continue, and then we'll come back to our investors as soon as we have a sense of timing or decisions at the regulatory level. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. Next question. Do you run the lending business off your own balance sheet or with a partner? Is the data analysis of who is eligible for a loan yours, or does a partner do it for you?
All right, let me start off with the structure of the Mobile Money industry. The regulatory framework in Ghana today, the PSSA, is a bank-led model. What that means is all funds are held by banks, and all products are supported by banks. For that reason, the risk of lending will sit with a banking partner. However, there are commercial arrangements to share that risk in different proportions if that may create a better commercial proposition for parties involved. In our lending product, we have three partners. We have the bank, we have a technology partner, and then we have MTN that has the customer. The technology partner provides a platform to run the algorithms for determining credit scoring, applies those algorithms for eligibility, and also manages the disbursements of loans based on the different eligibility levels that a customer may be assigned.
MTN's role is really to ensure communication with the customer. We are the front end. We present the product, we manage the customer, support the customer, and ensure that, you know, all the recoveries and everything else that goes with a lending product are managed on the MTN side. The customer interaction is solely on the MTN side. On the bank side, the bank will play their role as per the PSSA, the Payment Systems and Services Act, keeping the cash, the trust account, the pool account, and that's really how these products work. Today we have three different lending products, each are backed by a different bank. We have, you know, three different banks that have partnered with us, and we'll continue to expand in these areas depending on different bank affinity for these types of services. Thank you.
Thank you, Selorm. Next question. Would you explain what you mean practically by your discussion of MTN as a platform? What functionally would be different from what is true about your business today?
I think in simplistic terms, we would like to look at a platform as a business that seeks to be more of a middleman than a consumer-focused or consumer-interactive player. An example in simplistic terms, if I take our Chenosis business as an example, we create a platform that allows other entities to tap into our technology to enable consumer services on their side. A bank, for example, may take an API from MTN on Chenosis and create a consumer service out of access to that API, and therefore, the consumer interaction wouldn't be from MTN. The consumer interaction will be from the bank, but the relationship between the bank and MTN will be on a B2B basis. That's a drastic change to currently our largely B2C focus across most of our services.
We should expect to see a lot more B2B, B2B2C type of services than a purely B2C service as we have it in our current model. I mean, I hope this clarifies the point and gives you a very simplistic, I guess, picture of what a platform service may look like. Thanks.
Thank you, Selorm. I think I have one last question, but I think I'll end with that question. Currently, I don't have any other questions. Okay. I think, let me ask this. I think it's an icebreaker question for Selorm, and it's a very big one. Someone wants to know, will Liverpool win the league this year?
You know, I could have guessed it was about Liverpool, you know.
I'm waiting patiently for your response, Selorm.
My response, without applying too much analytics, is that Liverpool will win the league this year. I hope that my words come true in the end. I'm happy to put a wager on it.
Okay.
I will be behind the scenes. Thank you.
Okay. That, that concludes the questions we have. Selorm, if you have any closing remarks.
Just to say thank you very much to the investor community for the support and also for your confidence in us and management. We look forward to our next engagement early next year, and we'll continue to do our part as management to drive growth within the business over the final three months or the final quarter of the year. Thank you very much, and have a wonderful rest of the day, and have a wonderful rest of the year. Cheers.
Thank you, Selorm. Just to opine on what Selorm said, thanks everyone for making time for today's call. If your questions, you could not type your questions, just contact me after the call, and I'll be glad to assist. You can go onto our website on Monday for the call transcript and audio for this call. If we don't speak again, Merry Christmas to everyone. Bye.