Visa and Citcon Partner to Expand Real-Time Payments and Cross-Border Money Movement

Debit and prepaid card adoption has expanded across Africa, but access to formal credit has continued to lag, leaving many existing cardholders without borrowing options tied to their accounts. Visa Flex Credential allows issuers to combine multiple funding sources on a single card, giving financial institutions a way to add credit to established debit or prepaid products without issuing a separate credential or rebuilding their technology systems.

Visa said on Aug. 20, 2026, it had partnered with credit-infrastructure provider _able and pan-African payments company Onafriq to bring those capabilities to existing card portfolios. Onafriq will process eligible prepaid-card implementations and connect participating institutions to a network reaching about 1 billion mobile wallets and 500 million bank accounts across Africa. _able will supply a unified platform supporting credit and savings products across multiple processing environments.

Visa, one of the world’s largest payment networks, earns fees as card spending, cross-border activity and processed transactions rise. Its growth strategy now extends beyond consumer credit and debit payments into Visa Direct, which supports real-time payouts, remittances and other money-movement use cases. The company is also pairing artificial intelligence with tokenized credentials to support emerging forms of digital commerce, a push aimed at preserving its role as wallets, instant-payment rails and AI agents reshape how consumers and businesses transact.

Visa said on July 28, 2026 that net revenue for its fiscal third quarter ended June 30 rose 14% to $11.6 billion, while GAAP net income increased 7% to $5.6 billion. Constant-currency payments volume climbed 10%, and processed transactions rose 10% to 71.7 billion. Visa Direct handled 4 billion transactions, up 21% from a year earlier, underscoring momentum in money movement as card spending remained resilient. Adjusted earnings were $3.32 a share, an 11% increase.

Freight and shipping platforms have digitized how cargo is booked and managed, but the financial plumbing behind global trade remains fragmented. Payments take an average of 42 days to reach the invoicing company, while labor-intensive document processing and administration can account for nearly one-fifth of transportation costs. The tie-up is significant because it combines Visa’s commercial payments, acceptance and risk expertise with Airwallex’s multi-currency infrastructure and embedded-finance technology.

Visa and Airwallex announced the collaboration in London on July 23, 2026, saying they will jointly develop financial tools for freight platforms, digital forwarders and logistics marketplaces. The companies plan to embed payments, working-capital access and cross-border fund flows directly into freight workflows, aiming to shorten settlement delays and ease foreign-exchange complexity. No investment amount, launch timetable or initial customers were disclosed, indicating the initiative remains at the development stage.

MoneyHash is a Dubai-based payment orchestration and infrastructure platform that lets merchants across the Middle East and North Africa connect with multiple payment providers through a single interface. The companies began working together in 2024 and are now deepening the partnership to reduce the complexity of cross-market integration, operations and compliance for merchants.

MoneyHash and Visa announced on April 17, 2026, that they had signed a multiyear agreement to integrate Visa's Cybersource technology into MoneyHash's orchestration layer. A single integration will give merchants access to Visa's global infrastructure and a range of domestic and international payment methods. The companies did not disclose the value or exact duration of the agreement.

Visa Direct is Visa's real-time money movement network, enabling banks, fintech firms, businesses and governments to send funds to eligible cards, bank accounts and digital wallets. Payment systems and regulatory requirements vary across the Nordic countries, typically forcing cross-border providers to establish separate integrations. Moonrise, Lunar's banking-as-a-service platform, provides local infrastructure that can lower technical barriers to entering Denmark, Sweden and Norway.

Visa Direct and Moonrise announced a partnership on March 27, 2026, that will provide access to local accounts and payment rails in Denmark, Sweden and Norway through a single API. The service will cover virtual accounts, collections and payouts while supporting real-time domestic payments and local account access. The agreement builds on Visa's existing relationship with Lunar. The companies did not disclose the value or duration of the deal, its initial customers or a formal launch timetable.