Ghana is testing cross-border payments that could connect mobile wallets and bank accounts across Ghana, Nigeria and Rwanda, as the country pushes to make regional transactions faster and less dependent on overseas banking intermediaries.
The Bank of Ghana disclosed the pilots on October 13 at an event held alongside the IMF and World Bank annual meetings in Bangkok, according to the Ghana News Agency. The tests cover central bank digital currencies, stablecoins, bank accounts and mobile wallets across the Ghana–Nigeria and Ghana–Rwanda corridors.
Ghana has also extended the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS) to mobile wallets in the Ghana–Nigeria corridor. PAPSS was largely focused on bank-to-bank settlement, so the expansion could bring more mobile-money users into formal cross-border payment channels.
The central bank says the aim is to move the pilots towards live services while building on existing systems rather than creating entirely new infrastructure. Governor Johnson Pandit Asiama also highlighted the cost of duplicative licensing for fintech firms operating in multiple African markets and pointed to Ghana’s licensing passporting framework with Rwanda as a possible regional model.
For traders and smaller businesses, wallet interoperability could reduce friction when paying suppliers across borders. But the announcement describes pilots, not a fully deployed service. The practical impact will depend on implementation, regulatory safeguards, fraud controls and whether the systems can deliver reliable, affordable transactions at scale.
Source: Ghana News Agency, October 13, 2026.