Eric Muriuki is leaving NCBA Group to join Absa Group as Managing Executive for Pan-African Growth Strategy, Platforms and Digital Ventures, starting this month and based in the Johannesburg area.

At NCBA he was Group Director, Digital Business and CEO of LOOP DFS, the neobank behind the LOOP app for younger and salaried customers, and NCBA has not announced who will run LOOP DFS after his departure.

Muriuki began his career at Citi in Kenya in 1999 as a Business Systems Manager, moved to Co-operative Bank of Kenya as Business Change Manager in 2004, and joined Commercial Bank of Africa in July 2007, remaining through its 2019 merger with NIC Group that created NCBA, giving him about 19 years at the bank.

Within NCBA he served as Programme Director, Enterprise Transformation from July 2007 to August 2012, General Manager, New Business Ventures from August 2012 to September 2019, and Group Director, Digital Business and CEO of LOOP DFS from October 2019 until his move.

He is linked to the launch of M-Shwari in 2012 and its rollout to Tanzania as M-Pawa and to Uganda, Rwanda and Ivory Coast as MoKash, as well as the development of the Fuliza overdraft service built with Safaricom and KCB; Fuliza disbursed KSh1.25 trillion in 2025, up about 38 per cent from KSh906 billion in 2024, and NCBA’s digital business supplied 32 per cent of group profit before tax in 2025, equal to KSh9.0 billion.

Muriuki says he had a hand in the trust-account model that allows Safaricom’s M-Pesa balances to be held in a bank trust account outside Safaricom’s books, and a podcast quotes him describing CBA’s contribution as “designing and putting in place the model”; a 2017 Oxford paper notes that Central Bank legal experts developed the trust account under trust law, with money held at CBA, indicating shared credit.

NCBA is being acquired by Nedbank, which agreed to buy a 66 per cent stake for ZAR 13.9 billion (about KSh110 billion), paid 20 per cent in cash and 80 per cent in Nedbank shares, with the Central Bank of Kenya approving the deal on August 28, 2026 and remaining approvals expected by the end of the third quarter.

Absa launched the Absa Next app on September 25 as a template for digital banking in other markets and appointed Sitoyo Lopokoiyit as Chief Executive of Personal and Private Banking from April 1, 2026 after his role as Managing Director of M-Pesa Africa at Safaricom, where he was credited with driving Fuliza’s launch.

His new title at Absa covers growth strategy across Africa, platforms and digital ventures, but Absa has not detailed the specific markets or products involved.