KAF Digital Bank has received approval from Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) and the ministry of finance to commence operations as a digital bank. This according to the consortium led by KAF Investment Bank along with used car e-commerce platform Carsome, MoneyMatch, Jirnexu, and StoreHub.
According to its press release, the approval was granted on 20 December 2024. The digital bank will soon begin alpha testing its app with a select group of users before expanding to wider beta testing phase. After it successfully completes the closed-group testings, it will then open up its Shariah compliant platform to public sign-ups.
To recap, the consortium is one of five entities that managed to gain digital banking licence from BNM back in 2022. While three of these entities have already launched their respective digital banks, namely Boost Bank, GXBank, and AEON Bank, the KAF-led consortium as well as another by Sea and YTL digital have yet to release a publicly available product.
Last year, it was reported that the digital banks by the KAF and Sea-YTL consortiums have been delayed due to technical issues, with BNM allegedly rejected their launch due to poor IT planning. Following this, Sea, the parent company of e-commerce giant Shopee, stated that it planned to launch its digital bank by the end of 2024, but there has been no further update on its progress since then.
(Source: KAF Digital Bank)
