The move radically changes the ownership structure of PayInc, the developer and manager of rapid payments platform PayShap, by giving equal shareholding to the major banks and the public sector through the Reserve Bank.
"The Reserve Bank's focus is on financial stability and so having them take an active stake in the payment's intermediary that underpins payments in South Africa is, I think, a strategic tool for them to effect that," PayInc CEO Stephen Linnell said in an interview with TechCentral.
The investment by the Bank achieves a few things, Linnell said. It's a public-private partnership that "reflects a much more public interest agenda".