DHAKA, June 4 (Xinhua) -- Bangladesh's leading mobile money carrier Nagad has become the South Asian country's first full-fledged digital bank, said the Mobile Financial Services (MFS) operator's spokesman on Tuesday.
Muhammad Zahidul Islam Sajal, head of Media and Communications at Nagad, told Xinhua that the central bank of Bangladesh granted the final license to Nagad Digital Bank PLC on Monday and added it to the list of scheduled banks.
Mohammad Shahriar Siddiqui, director (BRPD) of Bangladesh Bank, handed over a copy of the digital bank license to Tanvir A Mishuk, founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of Nagad Ltd., on Monday at the office of Bangladesh Bank's Governor Abdur Rouf Talukder.
To grow into a complete financial solution, the MFS provider said it established the digital bank that will make available all financial services on a single platform, with the aim of taking the company's valuation to 2 billion U.S. dollars.
Upon receiving the digital bank license, Mishuk said, "We have been advocating for a digital bank to transform Bangladesh into a smart economy through cashless transactions."
He said a significant portion of the country's people remains out of financial inclusion, and the Nagad Digital Bank will work with them.
In about five years of its journey, Nagad's registered customers now stand at 95 million, with its daily transactions hitting more than 153 million U.S. dollars on average.
Nagad last year emerged as a unicorn startup in only four years, becoming the fastest one in Bangladesh to achieve this remarkable feat. ■
