The Kenya Deposit Insurance Corporation (KDIC) operates a single retail ceiling of KES 500,000 per depositor per member institution, raised from the long-standing KES 100,000 figure under the Kenya Deposit Insurance Act 2012 and subsequent KDIC schedules. Membership is statutory for commercial banks chartered under the Banking Act CAP 488 — KCB Bank Kenya Ltd, NCBA Bank Kenya PLC, Equity Bank Kenya Ltd, Co-operative Bank of Kenya, and their peers — and KDIC-eligible for microfinance banks chartered under the Microfinance Act 2006 if they are KDIC members. The ceiling applies across all balances at the same institution combined: current account, savings, fixed deposits, and channel-linked sub-accounts (KCB M-PESA buckets, M-Shwari savings, Eazzy goal accounts) are netted before the KES 500,000 cover is calculated.
The M-Pesa wallet is NOT KDIC-covered — and this is the single most important structural fact in the Kenyan retail-banking landscape. Safaricom PLC operates M-Pesa under a CBK mobile-money licence issued under the National Payment System Act 2011, not a banking licence. Customer float is held in segregated M-Pesa Trust Accounts at custodian commercial banks; the trust ring-fences the float from Safaricom's own corporate balance sheet, but the individual M-Pesa user does not hold a direct bank-customer relationship with the custodian. The user holds a creditor claim against the trust, and the trust holds the bank-customer relationship. This is categorically different from a chartered-bank deposit, where the depositor and the bank have a direct contractual relationship and KDIC cover attaches per depositor per bank.
KCB M-PESA and M-Shwari are different — and they are KDIC-covered. KCB M-PESA is a deposit-and-loan product inside KCB Bank Kenya Ltd's commercial-bank licence, accessed through the M-Pesa channel. M-Shwari (launched 2012) is the savings-and-microloan product inside NCBA Bank Kenya PLC, formed from the 2019 NIC + CBA merger. Both balances sit on a chartered bank's balance sheet, both are KDIC-covered to KES 500,000 per depositor per bank, and both are statutorily distinct from the standalone M-Pesa wallet. The "M-" prefix and the M-Pesa onboarding flow make all three feel like the same product family; the licence on the receiving entity decides the protection. Equity Eazzy is the Equity Bank Kenya Ltd app surface — same licence-class outcome, KDIC-covered to the same KES 500,000 ceiling, accessed through Equity's own channel rather than the M-Pesa channel.
See the centralbank.go.ke licensee register and kdic.go.ke insured-institution list for current licence and KDIC status, and Safaricom Investor Relations (NSE: SCOM) and the Business Daily Africa coverage of the M-Pesa Trust Account structure for the primary disclosures behind the MMO licence-class distinction.