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By Alexis Akwagyiram and Didi Akinyelure
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LAGOS, June 25 (Reuters) - Online sports betting wagering is booming in soccer-mad Nigeria mostly thanks to payment systems established by homegrown innovation firms that are beginning to make online businesses more practical.
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For several years, mobile payments failed to remove in Nigeria as they have in countries such as Kenya, where Safaricom's M-Pesa money transfers have promoted a culture of cashless payments.

Fear of electronic fraud and sluggish internet speeds have actually held Nigerian online customers back but wagering firms states the brand-new, fast digital payment systems underpinning their sites are changing attitudes towards online transactions.

"We have seen significant development in the number of payment services that are offered. All that is definitely altering the video gaming area," said Seun Anibaba, CEO of Lagos State Lotteries Board, gaming regulator in Nigeria's industrial capital.

"The operators will opt for whoever is faster, whoever can connect to their platform with less problems and problems," he said, adding that taxes from sports betting in Lagos State increased 30 percent to 40 percent in 2017 from 2016.

That growth has actually been matched by an increase in web payments, according to information from the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS), which is owned by the main bank and certified banks.

In 2016, there were 14 million web payments worth an overall 132 billion naira ($420 million). Transactions jumped to 29 million worth 185 billion in 2017 and in the very first quarter of 2018 there were nearly 10 million worth 61 billion.

With a young population of almost 190 million, increasing mobile phone usage and falling information costs, Nigeria has actually long been viewed as a terrific chance for online services - once consumers feel comfy with electronic payments.

Online sports betting firms state that is happening, though reaching the 10s of millions of Nigerians without access to banking services remains a challenge for pure online merchants.

British online sports betting company Betway opened its first African business in Kenya in 2015, followed by Uganda, Ghana and South Africa. It released in Nigeria in January.

"There is a steady shift to online now, that is where the market is going," Betway's Nigeria supervisor Lere Awokoya said.

"The development in the variety of fintechs, and the federal government as an enabler, has helped the company to grow. These technological shifts motivated Betway to start operating in Nigeria," he stated.

FINTECH COMPETITION

sports betting companies capitalizing the soccer craze worked up by Nigeria's participation in the World Cup say they are finding the payment systems created by regional start-ups such as Paystack are proving popular online.

Paystack and another regional startup Flutterwave, both established in 2016, are providing competitors for Nigeria's Interswitch which was established in 2002 and was the main platform used by services running in Nigeria.

"We added Paystack as one of our payment options without any fanfare, without revealing to our customers, and within a month it shot up to the number one most used payment choice on the site," stated Akin Alabi, creator of NairabBET.

He said NairaBET, the country's 2nd greatest sports betting company, now had 2 million regular customers on its website, up from 500,000 in 2013, and Paystack remained the most popular payment choice because it was added in late 2017.

Paystack was established by 2 Nigerian computer system science graduates, Shola Akinlade and Ezra Olubi, who received early stage funding in Silicon Valley's Y-Combinator program.

In December 2016, it raised $1.3 million from investors consisting of China's Tencent and Comcast Ventures in the United States.

Paystack, based in the mad Ikeja of Lagos, said the number of regular monthly transactions it processed increased from about 8,000 in early 2016 to more than 900,000 as of June 2018.

"In early 2016 we were processing about $3,000 a month. Today we process well over $11 million each and every single month," said Emmanuel Quartey, Paystack's head of growth.

He stated an environment of designers had emerged around Paystack, creating software application to integrate the platform into websites. "We have actually seen a growth in that community and they have carried us along," stated Quartey.

Paystack said it allows payments for a number of wagering firms however also a wide range of services, from utility services to transport business to insurance provider Axa Mansard.

Flutterwave, co-founded by Nigerian business owner Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, is also backed by the Y-Combinator programme as well as venture capitalists Greycroft Partners and Green Visor Capital and the Omidyar Network. It raised $10 million in 2015.

FOREIGN INVESTMENT

Shifts in Nigeria's payment culture have accompanied the arrival of foreign investors intending to take advantage of sports betting.

Industry experts state the sector creates about $1 billion a year and is most likely to grow faster than in South Africa and Kenya where business is more developed.

Russia's 1XBet and Slovakia's DOXXbet have actually both set up in Nigeria in the last 2 years while Italy's Goldbet was ahead of the pattern, taking a 50 percent stake in market leader Bet9ja when the Nigerian company released in 2015.

NairaBET's Alabi stated its sales were split between shops and online however the ease of electronic payments, expense of running shops and ability for customers to prevent the preconception of gambling in public suggested online deals would grow.

But regardless of advances in digital payments, Kunle Soname - chairman and co-founder of Bet9ja - stated it was very important to have a shop network, not least because many consumers still remain unwilling to spend online.

He stated the business, with about 60 percent of Nigeria's sports betting wagering market, had an extensive network. Nigerian sports betting stores often serve as social hubs where consumers can watch soccer complimentary of charge while placing bets.

At a BetKing hall deep inside the bustling Oshodi market in Lagos, dozens of soccer fans collected to view Nigeria's last warm up game before the World Cup.

Richard Onuka, a factory worker who earns 25,000 naira a month, was focused on a TV screen inside. He said he began sports betting three months back and bets up to 1,000 naira a day.

"Since I have actually been playing I have not won anything but I believe that one day I will win," stated Onuka. ($1 = 314.5000 naira) (Reporting by Alexis Akwagyiram and Didi Akinyelure in Lagos