Nigeria cracks down on ‘spraying’ money at parties to defend currency

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Spraying is believed to have originated among the Yoruba people in the 20th century and is now a mainstay of the country’s culture, a symbol of ostentation and a practice that unites an ethnically fractious nation.

Politicians have been known to spray crowds with cash. There’s a cottage industry of vendors offering fresh banknotes to partygoers looking to spray their hosts. And some Nigerians have taken to spraying with dollars since the naira crackdown began.

From: Nigeria cracks down on ‘spraying’ money at parties to defend currency.

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Business of Payments – May 2025 – by Geoffrey Barraclough

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The digital euro is a long-term play, but in the short term the European Payments Initiative (EPI) has launched its commercial wallet. Called wero (from “we” and “euro”), the project got a boost with news that Revolut is joining although not as a shareholder. Revolut is the first neo-bank involved in the initiative and brings customers, credibility and fintech glamour to the project.

Wero currently covers Germany, France, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Wallets from other nations (like Bizum, Bancomat, and SIBS) have formed the EuroPA alliance which was bolstered this month as Vipps (Norway/Sweden) and Blik (Poland) have signed a letter of intent to join.

EuroPA advocates interoperability between schemes rather than their replacement with a single European product. Speaking at Web Summit, Blik’s CEO said: “Interoperability is not just a vision—it’s a necessity.”

Martina Weimar, wero’s CEO, initially dismissed the idea of interoperability with EuroPA members, saying it didn’t “create synergies.” But she’s since changed course, confirming that EPI is now exploring cooperation with Bizum, SIBS, and others.

Wero is live for P2P transactions (see below advert in Belgium) and the pilot eCommerce acceptance launches in May, with general availability in September. Nuvei has joined Computop (Nexi) and PPRO as a distribution partner.

From: Business of Payments – May 2025 – by Geoffrey Barraclough.

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Business of Payments – May 2025 – by Geoffrey Barraclough

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SoftPOS is a clearly long-term threat to payment terminals but, as PSE Consulting points out, traditional payment hardware is still needed to process offline PIN verifications (a big issue in the UK) and provide tactile key input for blind customers. And many merchants in Europe are still running on installed Windows software which limits the benefits of softPOS. The latter may explain why less than 20% of ISVs currently offer SoftPOS according to Flagship Consulting.

From: Business of Payments – May 2025 – by Geoffrey Barraclough.

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Singapore ponders caning punishment for scammers

The Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) certainly recommends a more robust approach than the British Bankers’ Association (now part of UK Finance) has opted for in the past. Loretta Yuen, chair of the ABS’ fraud committee told the Financial Rimes that they see “caning as a strong deterrent”, adding “It’s a deterrent, but there is also a sense of revenge to it”.

Business of Payments – May 2025 – by Geoffrey Barraclough

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In the UK, Sainsbury’s has added softPOS to its Zebra SmartShop devices. Shoppers use the device to scan products that they put into their shopping basket. Now, instead of docking the SmartShop device at the checkout and paying on a card payment terminal, they can pay directly on the SmartShop device itself. This should save time.

From: Business of Payments – May 2025 – by Geoffrey Barraclough.

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