According to a new survey by the Competition Authority of Kenya (CAK), more men borrow from digital lending platforms than women.

The survey indicates that men are registered on multiple digital borrowing platforms compared to their female counterparts.

“There was multiple borrowing among male than female borrowers with 9.71% of men having more than one account as compared to 7.74% of women.”

Similarly, the survey found that 77 percent of people who used mobile loans could not be able to repay them. This is similar to the high penalty fee rate faced by digital borrowers.

Additionally, it revealed that M-Pesa overdraft facilities such as Fuliza, M-Shwari, and KCB M-Pesa are the most popular digital lending platforms.

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”Out of those 54% of users, 91% of mobile loan users had used the three products affiliated with the M-PESA platform, that is, M-Shwari, Fuliza, and KCB M-PESA.”

Further, it indicates that only 38% of mobile loan users had ever used any other product besides these three.

“This showed that the M-PESA platform was dominantly used for the provision of digital loans.”

The study, conducted in 2021, was released during the Authority’s inaugural Competition and Consumer Protection Law Digest last Friday.

CAK’s Law Digest was developed with the National Council for Law Reporting (Kenya Law).

It aims to bolster the country's understanding of competition and consumer protection law, expose stakeholders to the authority’s decision-making processes, and further develop jurisprudence.