Ghana wants regulatory efforts among participating agencies to be harmonized centrally rather than in silos
Africa’s digital asset economy is becoming more complex and consequential. Mariblock is evolving into an information institution built to help the people shaping the market understand what matters and what comes next.
Stablecoin wallet provider Blockradar has hit $1 billion in transaction volume, two years after launch. It now supports 100s of fintechs across 20 countries.
The milestone underscores the infrastructure quietly powering Africa’s stablecoin boom.
Last year at ETHSafari in Kilifi, Kenya, I spoke to two founders building a payments startup. One told me his team had two engineers, neither a blockchain specialist. Integrating Celo took about two months.
Then they switched to Blockradar.
“It’s like a normal API. They built it like a normal API. It doesn’t feel blockchain at all,” he told me.
Companies putting stablecoins into financial products eventually face the complexity of multiple blockchains. Blockradar abstracts that complexity into familiar API calls, turning months of integration work into hours or days.
Tether and Circle have something to worry about in Open USD. A new stablecoin consortium backed by more than 140 companies, including Visa, Mastercard, Stripe and PayPal, is aiming to challenge the Tether-Circle duopoly. Its key differentiator is that participating institutions will share in the token’s revenue.
As with most ambitious industry initiatives, the announcement has divided opinion. Among the sceptics is the director of digital assets research at Ark Invest, who argues that a network of competitors will struggle to move quickly enough to compete with vertically integrated issuers.
But history adds more texture to the picture once you zoom into the motivations of successful for-profit consortia. Coordination tends to be easier when the goal is to break entrenched market power.
The Open Handset Alliance brought together competing technology firms to build Android to challenge the Apple-BlackBerry smartphone duopoly. Airbus began as a European consortium designed to counter American dominance in commercial aviation. The same story applies to Star Alliance and SEMATECH in the semiconductor industry.
As stablecoin adoption grows, many of the institutions entering the space are unwilling to rely on, and thereby further entrench, the existing Tether-Circle duopoly. That incentive outweighs the coordination challenge if stablecoins are here to stay.
The Bank of Ghana and SEC have jointly directed virtual asset service providers to cease mass marketing and remove billboards, days after admitting six entities into a regulatory sandbox.
Parliament’s approval of the Virtual Asset Service Providers Bill gives regulators authority over crypto activities, ending years of policy ambiguity.
The cohort marks Africa’s strongest showing yet — and comes as ecosystem grants increasingly serve as early-stage capital for blockchain startups navigating a tougher post-FTX funding climate.
Africa is seeing high crypto wallet adoption, but actual usage and value remain limited. Experts say economic realities, short-term utility and product gaps help explain the disconnect.
The coalition is pushing to scrap Kenya’s now-revised 1.5% crypto transfer tax, calling it unfair, innovation-stifling, and out of step with global norms.
The startup offers non-custodial swaps, is developing its own wallet, and believes user control is key to adoption.
Reflections from Paris Blockchain Week: institutional momentum, real-world utility, and why African builders must be part of the global conversation.
For Minipay, stablecoins aren’t just a product but the foundation for cross-border payments, savings, and financial inclusion in a fragmented continent.
The partnership aims to enable 24/7 blockchain-powered payments into nine African countries using Ripple’s XRP ledger
Join us on Dec. 12 at Nordic Hotel, Lagos, for groundbreaking discussions on stablecoins’ transformative role in Africa’s future. Don’t miss out—RSVP today!
The Nairobi Securities Exchange is looking to accelerate the tokenization of securities, targeting tech-savvy investors in Kenya's capital markets.
Crypto exchanges Quidax and Busha receive “Approval-in-Principle” as Nigeria takes steps towards regulating the crypto industry.
Tigran Gambaryan’s legal team has not been allowed into the prison since July 26 while Gambaryan has suffered additional health complications.
Seychelles, long regarded as a crypto-friendly jurisdiction, is moving to rein in the digital asset industry within its borders as consumer complaints about crypto-related losses continue to rise.
A bipartisan House resolution urges Nigeria to free Tigran Gambaryan, detained since February, citing health concerns and due process violations.
