Almost 1 million Ethiopians who previously have never used banking services have opened new bank accounts following the Ethiopian government’s decision to replace birr’s notes.
BLOOMBERG – Ethiopia’s effort to stamp out counterfeiting by introducing new currency notes is pulling people who’ve never had a bank account into the financial system. Over the past four weeks, almost 1 million previously unbanked Ethiopians have handed in their two-decade-old banknotes, according to the central bank. In exchange, they were given a bank account from which they can draw the new notes. The rush of applications forced the nation’s biggest commercial lender to assign more tellers to only handle money changing at its main branch next to its headquarters in the capital, Addis Ababa. […] CONTINUE READING
