Nigerian digital payments powerhouse OPay has engaged Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, and JPMorgan Chase as it advances plans for a United States initial public offering, targeting a valuation of approximately $4 billion in what would represent one of the most significant capital market milestones ever achieved by an Africa-focused financial technology company.
The company, backed by SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2, was considering a US listing that could proceed later in the year, though the timing and size of the transaction remained under active consideration, according to a Bloomberg report. Neither OPay nor any of the banks involved had publicly confirmed the plans.
If consummated at the projected valuation, the offering would mark a dramatic leap from the company’s last publicly disclosed valuation of approximately $2 billion following its $400 million Series C funding round in 2021, which at the time ranked among the largest venture capital raises ever recorded for an Africa-focused startup.
Founded in 2018 by Opera-backed investors, OPay began as an ambitious super-app spanning ride-hailing, food delivery, and logistics before a decisive strategic pivot transformed it into one of Nigeria’s dominant digital financial platforms following the Lagos State Government’s restrictions on commercial motorcycles in 2020. The company subsequently channeled its entire focus into financial services, building a vast agent banking and merchant payments ecosystem that now serves over 30 million registered users through more than 500,000 agents nationwide.
The company’s rise has coincided with Nigeria’s aggressive cashless policy drive and the rapid expansion of agency banking, which has fundamentally reshaped retail financial transactions in Africa’s largest economy. For early investors including SoftBank, Sequoia China, Redpoint China, and Source Code Capital, a US listing would deliver a long-awaited liquidity event while opening access to deeper pools of global institutional capital.
Industry analysts said a successful OPay listing would function as a referendum on global investor appetite for African digital finance at a time when venture funding had become more selective and valuation discipline had returned to technology markets worldwide. They noted that another African payments giant, Flutterwave, had repeatedly signaled its intention to pursue an IPO but had yet to confirm a timeline.
