Middle East & North Africa (MENA)

Egypt's scale, Jordan's shared rails and Morocco's bridge to Africa

This edition covers banking in the Middle East and North Africa beyond the Gulf, led by Egypt, with Jordan and Morocco. Large state banks and fast-growing wallets in Egypt, shared national payment rails in Jordan and pan-African banking groups in Morocco sit beside Islamic banks and growing sukuk markets. Compare it with the Gulf and see what travels both ways.

Play the World tour: 10 cases Compare the regions

CairoAmmanCasablanca

At a glance

76.3%Egyptians aged 15+ using financial accounts (CBE, June 2025)

16 million+Users of InstaPay, Egypt's instant payment app (CBE, 2025)

2.39 millionCliQ instant-payment users in Jordan (JoPACC, September 2026)

16.3 millionInstant transfers made in Morocco in 2024, their first full year

MENA

The markets

Egypt

Egyptian pound (EGP), flexible rate since March 2024 · Cairo · Alexandria

Central bank: Central Bank of Egypt (CBE): monetary policy and supervision of banks and the national payment system under Law 194 of 2020
Supervisors: CBE for banks and payments; Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA) for capital markets, insurance, non-bank finance and non-bank fintech
Payment rails: InstaPay on the Instant Payment Network (24/7, since 2022, built by Egyptian Banks Company), Meeza national cards and bank-issued mobile wallets
Open finance: At an early stage: fintechs reach accounts through partner banks, and CBE eKYC rules (2026) set up a Digital Financial Identity platform
Deposit protection: No explicit deposit insurance scheme in operation; depositors rely on CBE prudential supervision
Digital banks: Digital-bank rules in force since July 2023: onebank (Banque Misr) approved in 2025 as the first fully digital bank; CIB's yomo got preliminary approval in 2026
Islamic finance: About 5% of banking assets (IFSB, Q3 2024); four fully Islamic banks, incl. Faisal Islamic Bank of Egypt, and 11 banks with Islamic branches (2025)

Jordan

Jordanian dinar (JOD), pegged to the US dollar · Amman

Central bank: Central Bank of Jordan (CBJ): monetary policy and supervision of banks, payment providers, exchange houses, microfinance and insurers
Supervisors: CBJ for banks, payments, microfinance and insurance; Jordan Securities Commission (JSC) for capital markets
Payment rails: CliQ instant payments (since 2020, linked to wallets), JoMoPay mobile switch (2014) and eFAWATEERcom bills, run by JoPACC; CBJ RTGS for high value
Open finance: CBJ instructions regulating open financial services (No. 12 of 2022) govern how banks and providers share data and services
Deposit protection: Jordan Deposit Insurance Corporation: up to JOD 50,000 per depositor per bank, with a separate Islamic-bank fund since 2019
Digital banks: Digital-only brands run inside licensed banks, such as Reflect by Arab Bank; CBJ-licensed wallet providers connect through JoMoPay
Islamic finance: About 19% of banking assets (IFSB, Q3 2024); Jordan Islamic Bank, Islamic International Arab Bank, Safwa Islamic Bank and Al Rajhi Bank

Morocco

Moroccan dirham (MAD), euro–dollar basket peg, ±5% band · Casablanca (Casablanca Finance City) · Rabat

Central bank: Bank Al-Maghrib (BAM): monetary policy, the exchange-rate regime and supervision of credit institutions and payment institutions
Supervisors: BAM for banks, finance companies and payment institutions; AMMC for capital markets; ACAPS for insurance and pensions
Payment rails: Instant transfers (24/7, since June 2023) run by BAM and the interbank clearing group GSIMT; interoperable M-Wallet mobile payments (2018)
Open finance: At an early stage: the National Payments Strategy led by BAM focuses on interoperability, payment institutions and APIs for instant transfers
Deposit protection: Deposit guarantee funds managed by the Société Marocaine de Gestion des Fonds de Garantie des Dépôts Bancaires
Digital banks: Digital banking runs through licensed banks, with fully online account opening, and payment institutions offering payment accounts and M-Wallet
Islamic finance: About 2% of banking assets (IFSB, Q3 2024) but growing fast; participative banks since 2017, guided by the Higher Council of Ulemas; sovereign sukuk 2018

How banking is organised in MENA

Each market has one central bank that supervises its banks, with separate authorities for capital markets and, in Egypt, all non-bank finance. Large state-owned banks anchor Egypt, long-established private groups such as Arab Bank lead in Jordan, and Morocco's big banking groups have spread across Africa.

Egypt: state-owned National Bank of Egypt and Banque Misr are the largest banks, beside private banks such as CIB and Gulf-owned subsidiaries.
Egypt splits oversight: the CBE for banks and payments, the FRA for capital markets, insurance, consumer finance, leasing, factoring, microfinance and non-bank fintech.
Jordan: the dinar's US dollar peg anchors policy, so CBJ rates broadly track the Federal Reserve; the CBJ also supervises insurers, microfinance and payment providers.
Morocco: Attijariwafa bank, Banque Centrale Populaire and Bank of Africa operate across many African countries, so supervision crosses borders.
Currency regimes differ: a flexible Egyptian pound since March 2024, a dollar-pegged Jordanian dinar and a basket-pegged Moroccan dirham.

Payments and open finance

Instant payments now run in all three markets: InstaPay in Egypt (2022), CliQ in Jordan (2020) and instant transfers in Morocco (2023). Cash still matters, so central banks pair these rails with wallets, national card schemes and payment institutions. Open finance is furthest along in Jordan.

Egypt: InstaPay passed 16 million users and e-wallets reached 55.5 million (CBE, 2025).
Egypt's Meeza national card scheme passed 43.5 million cards issued by June 2025.
Jordan: JoPACC, owned by the CBJ and all operating banks, runs CliQ, JoMoPay, eFAWATEERcom, ACH and electronic cheque clearing on ISO 20022 rails.
Morocco made 16.3 million instant transfers in 2024, yet 86% of card uses were still cash withdrawals (BAM, 2024).
Open finance: the CBJ issued open financial services instructions in 2022; in Egypt and Morocco open banking is at an early stage.

Fintech, digital banks and digital assets

Egypt is the region's fintech engine: payments, consumer finance and SME lending firms licensed by the CBE or the FRA, and its first digital banks now coming to market. Jordan builds fintech through JoPACC and a CBJ sandbox, and Morocco is opening payments to licensed payment institutions.

CBE digital-bank rules took effect in July 2023; onebank, from Banque Misr, was approved in 2025 as the first fully digital bank, and CIB's yomo won preliminary approval in 2026.
Egypt's FRA licenses fintech in non-bank finance under Law 5 of 2022 and had licensed 16 fintech firms by May 2025.
In 2026 the CBE and Egypt's media regulator signed a protocol to oversee digital banking content.
Jordan passed a Virtual Assets Regulation Law (No. 14 of 2025); the CBJ runs the JoRegBox sandbox and JoPACC the JOIN Fincubator.
Morocco's payment institutions and the interoperable M-Wallet (2018) extend digital payments to people without a bank account.

Rules a bank must map here

Banks here apply Basel III capital and liquidity rules, expected-credit-loss provisioning, AML/CFT laws aligned with FATF standards, data-protection laws and consumer-protection rules, plus Islamic-bank rules where relevant. Morocco left the FATF's increased-monitoring list in February 2023 and Jordan in October 2023.

Egypt: the Central Bank and Banking Sector Law No. 194 of 2020, CBE capital, liquidity and governance rules, and the digital-bank (2023) and eKYC (2026) rules.
Egypt also: the AML law with the EMLCU as financial intelligence unit, the Personal Data Protection Law (2020) and FRA rules for non-bank finance and fintech.
Jordan: Banking Law No. 28 of 2000, AML Law No. 20 of 2021, Personal Data Protection Law No. 24 of 2023, open finance instructions (2022) and 2025 consumer-protection and climate-risk instructions.
Morocco: Banking Law 103-12 on credit institutions, with a reform passed in 2026 to strengthen early intervention and resolution; AML Law 43-05; Law 09-08 on personal data; Law 05-20 on cybersecurity.
Islamic banking: CBJ instructions for Islamic banks, such as liquidity rules (2025); in Morocco, BAM rules plus Shariah opinions from the Higher Council of Ulemas.

What operations teams wrestle with

Volumes on instant rails and wallets are rising fast while cash and cheques stay in use, so teams run old and new channels side by side. Scams on instant payments, digital onboarding at scale, remittance flows and cross-border group structures shape the daily work.

Social-engineering scams on InstaPay, CliQ and wallets: banks add confirmation steps, limits for new payees and real-time alerts.
Remote onboarding at scale: Egypt's eKYC rules (2026) and Digital Financial Identity platform need clean data, consent records and fraud checks.
Remittances are a major inflow: Jordan received USD 3.0 billion in the first seven months of 2026 (CBJ), so cross-border operations and screening matter.
Cash stays central: in Morocco 86% of card uses were withdrawals in 2024, so ATM networks, cash logistics and digital migration run together.
Cross-border groups: Moroccan banks run African subsidiaries and Gulf groups own Egyptian banks, so shared services must respect each host's outsourcing and data rules.

How SMEs get financed

Banks lead, steered by central-bank programmes and backed by public guarantee institutions. Egypt requires banks to direct a quarter of their credit to micro, small and medium enterprises, Jordan and Morocco rely on loan-guarantee institutions, and non-bank lenders add microfinance, leasing and factoring.

Egypt: since 2021 banks must allocate 25% of credit to MSMEs, including 10% to small enterprises (CBE); bank financing for small enterprises reached EGP 301 billion (2026).
Egypt: MSMEDA, the Credit Guarantee Company and the CBE's NilePreneurs initiative, with 140 business development centres in 25 governorates, support smaller firms.
Egypt's FRA licenses microfinance, leasing, factoring and fintech lenders, widening options beyond banks.
Jordan: the Jordan Loan Guarantee Corporation guarantees bank lending to SMEs, and CBJ programmes give banks lower-cost funding for priority sectors.
Morocco: Tamwilcom, the state financing and guarantee institution, backs bank loans to SMEs and very small firms, including the Intelaka programme (2020).

Islamic finance: an eye opener

Islamic finance: deep roots, open room

Modern Islamic banking has roots here: a profit-sharing savings bank opened in Mit Ghamr, Egypt, in 1963. Today Jordan's Islamic banks hold nearly a fifth of banking assets, Egypt issues sovereign sukuk, and Morocco licensed participative banks in 2017. Shares are still modest in Egypt and Morocco, so the room to grow is large.

Islamic share of banking assets (IFSB, Q3 2024): Jordan 19%, Egypt 5%, Morocco 1.9%, with Morocco growing about 28% a year over five years.
Egypt: four Islamic banks and 11 banks with Islamic branches (2025); a debut USD 1.5 billion sovereign sukuk in 2023, another in 2025, and a local sukuk programme.
Jordan: a separate deposit-insurance fund for Islamic banks since 2019, covering both credit (current) accounts and joint investment accounts, and CBJ instructions for Islamic banks.
Morocco: participative banks and windows since 2017, with Shariah opinions centralised in the Higher Council of Ulemas; a MAD 1 billion ijara sukuk in 2018.

What it offers everyone

Customers

Millions who avoid interest-bearing products gain a formal route to finance a home, a car or stock. The price and total due are fixed at signing, financing is tied to a real asset, and late-payment charges go to charity, so the cost does not compound.

Banks and financiers

Asset-backed and trade-linked financing keeps balance sheets close to the real economy, profit-sharing accounts align returns with performance, and new customer segments open, from Egypt's unbanked to Morocco's small firms.

Savers and investors

Returns come from real activity through profit-sharing accounts and sukuk backed by state assets or projects, with ethical screening; Egypt's sukuk drew strong demand from new investor groups at home and abroad.

The economy

Credit follows real trade and assets, debt is not sold on as debt, and excessive speculation is excluded. That ties finance to production, widens inclusion and channels savings into infrastructure through sukuk.

A concrete opening: Egypt asks banks to direct a quarter of their credit to smaller firms, while only about 5% of banking assets are Islamic. Asset-based working-capital products for SMEs, offered digitally, could serve firms that avoid interest.

Working with banking teams here

Working with banking teams in MENA

Warmth and relationships come first: expect tea or coffee, genuine interest in who you are and time to build trust before the detail. Decisions usually rest with senior leaders and committees, and respect for seniority and titles matters. These are common norms; individuals differ.

Common norms; individuals differ.

Egypt: hospitality is generous, conversation is warm and good humour is valued; confirm meetings the day before and summarise agreements in writing.
Large state-owned banks move through formal approvals and committees; map sponsors and decision-makers early and allow time.
Jordan: banking teams are often highly qualified and internationally experienced; meetings are courteous and focused, and English is common in documents.
Morocco: Arabic and Amazigh are official languages and French is widely used in banking documents; offering material in the team's working language shows respect.
Working weeks run Sunday to Thursday in Egypt and Jordan and Monday to Friday in Morocco; plan around public holidays and the summer period.

Learning from each other

What the GCC can learn from MENA

From Egypt: financial inclusion at national scale, linking InstaPay, Meeza cards and bank-led wallets, and a firm SME lending requirement for banks.
From Jordan: one payments company owned by the central bank and all banks, running instant payments, wallets and bills on shared rails.
From Morocco: banking groups that grew across Africa, managing many regulators, currencies and cultures from one home base.

What MENA can learn from the GCC

Islamic finance at scale: Shariah governance frameworks, AAOIFI standards and deep sukuk markets that could lift Egypt's and Morocco's modest shares.
Open banking delivered through licensed providers and central hubs, and digital-bank licensing carried from rules to launch within a few years.
Deposit protection designed for Islamic deposits, as in Bahrain and Oman: a model for markets still without an explicit scheme.

The World tour · MENA

Ten cases from MENA

Decide as bankers there decide: +1 if right, −1 if wrong, and every answer explained. Your score counts on the open MTWAFIQ Future Leaders board.

CultureCustomersDigital banksOpen financeOperationsPaymentsRegulationRisk and complianceSME and corporate

Play the World tour: 10 cases

The other regions

GCCIslamic finance at scale, national instant rails and regulators that move fast EuropeWhere global banking rules are written: a banking union, a single rulebook and instant euro payments by law UK & wider EuropeLondon's rulebook, Swiss and Norwegian rails, Türkiye's scale and Ukraine's resilience North AmericaDeep markets, many banks and payment rails modernising across three economies Latin America & CaribbeanBrazil's Pix, Colombia's Bre-B and open finance set by rule Sub-Saharan AfricaSouth Africa's instant rails, Kenya's mobile money, West Africa's shared central bank South AsiaIndia's public rails, Pakistan's Islamic shift and Bangladesh's mobile money Central Asia & CaucasusKaspi's super app, Astana's financial centre and new Islamic windows East & Southeast AsiaScale, speed and public rails: five markets setting the pace of digital banking Australia & NZTrans-Tasman banking: real-time rails, data rights and firm conduct rules Compare the regionsAll eleven regions in one table