O3 Capital Nigeria Limited (O3 Cards)
“Can a non-bank card issuer become Nigeria's default credit card brand across local (Verve), global (Mastercard) and premium (American Express) rails?”
Founded2014
HQLagos, Nigeria
FoundersAbimbola Pinheiro
IndustryFintech / Consumer banking
The story
Founded in 2014 as Nigeria's first non-bank credit card issuer, operating Naira-denominated credit and prepaid cards on the local Interswitch/Verve rails. Evolved from a single-product consumer credit card company into a multi-scheme issuer, adding USD-denominated Global Cards on Mastercard, launching the Blink borderless payments card, and becoming the first non-bank American Express issuer in Nigeria. Funding has come via the Nigerian debt capital markets (FMDQ commercial paper programme) rather than venture equity.
Product timeline
2014
Founded as Nigeria's first non-bank credit card issuer under CBN license· banking
2021
Launched O3 iOS mobile app for card management· product
2023
Listed ₦100m Series 1 Commercial Paper on FMDQ; followed by ₦750m Series 2· funding
2025
Launched O3 Global Cards (USD-denominated cards on Mastercard network) and Blink borderless payments product· card
2026
Launched O3 American Express card portfolio (first non-bank Amex issuer in Nigeria)· card
Regulated entities
2
regulatory licences held by O3 Capital Nigeria Limited (O3 Cards)
Licence types, jurisdictions and registered entities are in the Embedded Finance Index report.
The stack
6 layers disclosed in O3 Capital Nigeria Limited (O3 Cards)’s embedded-finance stack
Payments / PSP
Banking / BaaS
in the full report
Card issuing
in the full report
Card network
in the full report
Lending
in the full report
Investing
in the full report
Accounting gap: significant
11 more providers across 5 layers, with confidence-scored evidence and source URLs, are in the Embedded Finance Index report.