Interview With Yellow Card’s Leadership: Kamogelo Mosime
Interview With Yellow Card’s Leadership: Kamogelo Mosime. Yellow Card, the leading fintech innovator building critical payments infrastructure across Africa and emerging markets, has been named a finalist for the Payments Category at the first-ever Money Awards, hosted by Money20/20. The event will honour global innovators redefining the future of financial services in Las Vegas on Sunday, 26 October. StartUpMag recently had interview with Yellow Card’s South Africa Country Manager, Kamogelo Mosime regarding the company’s recent recognition as a finalist at the inaugural Money20/20 Money Awards. The conversation also gave insights into Yellow Card’s innovation, growth, and role in building payments infrastructure across Africa and other emerging markets. Check it out below!
What makes Yellow Card’s payments infrastructure uniquely suited for businesses operating in Africa and other emerging markets?
Yellow Card’s infrastructure was built specifically for the realities of African and emerging market payment systems. We combine traditional banking integrations, such as our partnerships with Nedbank and Standard Bank in South Africa, with blockchain-based stablecoin settlement rails. This hybrid model gives businesses reliable local pay-ins and pay-outs, along with near-instant USD-equivalent cross-border movement. Through our programmable API, businesses can automate disbursements, collections, and treasury workflows using ISO 20022 files and webhooks, creating seamless operations. What truly sets us apart is our regulatory-first design: each entity operates under local compliance, AML/CFT, and reporting frameworks, ensuring audit-ready flows. Combined with high processing reliability and local teams who understand each market’s banking and liquidity nuances, Yellow Card delivers both scale and trust in one infrastructure.
How can stablecoins help businesses save costs or gain efficiency compared to traditional cross-border payment systems?
Stablecoins remove the inefficiencies of multi-layered correspondent banking by enabling direct on-chain settlement between parties. This cuts transaction costs and settlement times drastically, from several days via SWIFT to minutes or hours. They also give businesses better FX control, allowing them to hold value in digital USD and convert only when needed, improving predictability in volatile markets. On-chain transparency simplifies reconciliation, while API-driven automation reduces manual work and human error. Together, these advantages make cross-border operations faster, cheaper, and more predictable.
What types of businesses benefit most from your API and widget products?
Our API and widget suite serve a wide range of enterprise clients. Importers, exporters, and distributors use it to pay suppliers faster and manage USD exposure. Marketplaces and fintechs rely on it for embedded cross-border pay-ins, pay-outs, and treasury flows under a compliant framework. BPOs, freelancer platforms, and SaaS providers use our rails for multi-country payroll and vendor disbursements, while institutional brokers and OTC desks leverage it for high-volume conversions and proof-of-payment automation.
Most importantly, our API gives businesses an easy way to expand across Africa and other emerging markets without the complex process of setting up local operations. In short, any business that moves money across borders or manages liquidity between currencies can benefit from Yellow Card’s infrastructure.
How does Yellow Card ensure compliance with local regulations across the 34 countries where you operate?
Yellow Card operates under a regulatory-first framework designed to align fully with the legal and supervisory requirements of every jurisdiction where we do business. We maintain locally incorporated subsidiaries in nearly all markets, each governed by its own board and AML/CFT policy, formally known as a Risk Management and Compliance Programme (RMCP), tailored to the laws and guidance of its national regulator.
Our approach is built on three pillars:
- Licensing and Regulatory Engagement: We hold (or are pursuing) formal authorisations across our markets.
- In South Africa, Yellow Card Financial South Africa holds a Category I Financial Services Provider (Crypto Asset Service Provider) licence from the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) and is registered with the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC).
- In Botswana, we are a licensed Virtual Asset Service Provider (VASP) under the Virtual Assets Act, supervised by the Non-Bank Financial Institutions Regulatory Authority (NBFIRA).
- In Poland, our European subsidiary is a registered VASP under the Polish AML Act and is preparing to transition to a MiCA licence once EU implementation is complete.
- In Nigeria, Yellow Card Nigeria operates in active engagement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under its Accelerated Regulatory Incubation Program (ARIP).
- Similar licensing or sandbox participation is in progress in other jurisdictions such as Namibia, Tanzania, Uganda, and the CEMAC region.
2. Localised AML/CFT Governance – Each entity administers its own AML/CFT policy (RMCP) consistent with FATF Recommendations and local AML laws, such as FICA in South Africa, the Money Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act in Nigeria, and the Financial Intelligence Acts of Botswana, Ghana, and others. These frameworks cover KYC/KYB, transaction monitoring, and Travel Rule implementation, ensuring robust detection and reporting of suspicious activity in line with local Financial Intelligence Units.
3. Group-Wide Oversight and Technology Integration – Our U.S. parent company, registered with FinCEN as a Money Services Business (MSB), oversees a unified global compliance program. We leverage advanced systems to maintain consistency, transparency, and auditability across jurisdictions.
We also maintain direct and ongoing engagement with regulators, participating in consultations, technical working groups, and sandbox programs with authorities such as the FSCA, FIC, SEC Nigeria, Bank of Zambia, and Bank of Ghana.
What security measures are in place when using Yellow Card’s stablecoin-based solutions?
Security is embedded into every part of our infrastructure. We use institutional-grade MPC custody for key management through Fireblocks, enforce address allow-listing, and implement strict approval policies. Access controls include single sign-on (SSO), multi-factor authentication (MFA), and least-privilege principles. Real-time monitoring across fiat and crypto flows detects anomalies and potential fraud, while all systems undergo external penetration tests, incident response reviews, and change management oversight. This ensures operational integrity and complete asset protection.
How do your partnerships with Visa and Fireblocks directly benefit businesses using your infrastructure?
Our partnership with Visa connects digital currency infrastructure to traditional payments, enabling stablecoin wallet-to-card functionality, cash-out options, and global acceptance all with bank-grade reconciliation. Fireblocks supports our institutional custody and treasury operations, providing secure MPC custody, address whitelisting, and workflow automation. Together, these partnerships offer enterprise-grade safety, usability, and interoperability between digital and fiat systems.
What are the costs involved in adopting Yellow Card’s solutions compared to traditional banking or remittance services?
Our pricing is transparent and based on three components: API usage, conversion/spread, and settlement fees. By cutting out correspondent banking layers, clients enjoy much lower per-transaction costs. Faster settlement, fewer reversals, and smoother reconciliation further reduce the total cost of ownership. While pricing depends on corridor and volume, our clients consistently experience both financial and operational gains over legacy systems.
If a company wants to learn how Yellow Card could specifically support them, what’s the first step?
The first step is simply to reach out. Every business has unique payment challenges, and we prefer to start with a conversation rather than a sales pitch. Once we understand your corridors and goals, our team guides you through onboarding, provides sandbox access for testing, and co-designs a pilot that fits your operations. From there, it’s about scaling what works. Whether through me or any of our regional teams, we’re always happy to connect, exchange ideas, and build solutions that move money more efficiently across Africa and beyond.
