“Can Saudi Arabia's largest mobile wallet evolve into the kingdom's dominant digital bank for consumers and SMEs?”
Launched in 2018 as STC Pay, the mobile wallet arm of Saudi Telecom Company, it became Saudi Arabia's largest e-wallet and one of the first SAMA-licensed EMIs. After Western Union's ~$200M minority investment in 2020 and the issuance of a digital banking license in 2021, the company replatformed onto Temenos and scaled to 8M+ accounts. In 2025 it completed its pivot from wallet to fully licensed digital bank, rebranding to STC Bank and expanding into SME merchant services, financing (working capital, capex, POS) and payroll.
STC Pay discloses STC Bank (in-house, SAMA-licensed) as its banking provider, according to the Embedded Finance Index 2026.
STC Pay does not disclose a bank charter of its own; its banking services are provided through STC Bank (in-house, SAMA-licensed).
STC Pay processes payments through STC Pay (self-operated wallet).
STC Pay's cards are issued through Visa (network) and issuance in-house under STC Bank license on the Visa network.
STC Pay's lending and capital products are provided by STC Bank (in-house).
STC Pay runs its ledger on Temenos (core banking ledger).
STC Pay uses Western Union (international remittance partner) for FX and cross-border payouts.
STC Pay's payroll is powered by STC Bank (in-house payroll product for SME merchants).
The Embedded Finance Index 2026 maps 9 layers in STC Pay's stack: Payments / PSP (STC Pay (self-operated wallet)); Banking / BaaS (STC Bank (in-house, SAMA-licensed)); Card issuing (Visa (network) and issuance in-house under STC Bank license); Card network (Visa); Ledger (Temenos (core banking ledger)); Lending (STC Bank (in-house), تمويل نقاط البيع (POS financing), تمويل النفقات الرأسمالية (Capex financing), تمويل رأس المال العامل (Working capital financing) and 3 others); Payroll (STC Bank (in-house payroll product for SME merchants)); Sponsor bank (STC Bank (in-house, SAMA-licensed)); FX & payouts (Western Union (international remittance partner)).
STC Pay is founded in 2018 and headquartered in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
STC Pay has raised $200M in total (latest round: Corporate Minority (Western Union, ~2020)).
Get a read on where your own stack stands against STC Pay and the rest of its category — what they built versus bought, which providers they use, and where the gaps in your own strategy and competitive set actually are.