“The last mile poses considerable risk because criminal organizations or terrorist groups like al-Shabaab in Somalia engage in fraudulent use of mobile numbers,” Norris says. Ahmed is undaunted. He predicts revenue from transactions to Africa, his biggest market, will double by 2020. WorldRemit is expanding into Pakistan and El Salvador, and it has secured money-transfer licenses in 47 U.S. states. Ahmed is counting on a surge of remittances from there and Western Europe even as anti-immigration populism is rising. “Migration is a fact of life,” he says. “And we don’t think that will change, Brexit or no Brexit, Trump or no Trump.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-09/refugee-turned-fintech-chief-aims-to-upend-a-444-billion-market