- High Remittance Costs Push African Users Towards Stablecoin Payments
Africa’s digital asset market is moving beyond speculative cryptocurrency trading as stablecoins increasingly become tools for remittances, cross-border commerce, foreign-exchange access and the preservation of value in economies affected by currency volatility.
The transition is sharpening debate over how African governments should regulate blockchain-based financial services without closing off innovations that could reduce the cost and complexity of moving money across borders.
Stablecoins are digital tokens typically designed to maintain a fixed value against currencies such as the US dollar. Their relative price stability makes them more practical for payments than cryptocurrencies whose values can fluctuate sharply.
Nigeria provides one of the clearest examples of the shift. The country received about US$59.00 billion in crypto-asset inflows between July 2023 and June 2024 and accounted for an estimated 60.00% of stablecoin activity in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the International Monetary Fund.
Demand is being driven partly by the cost and inefficiency of existing international payment channels.
Remittance fees in sub-Saharan Africa average about 9.00%, compared with a global average of approximately 6.00%. Stablecoins can allow users to transfer dollar-linked value through digital wallets without relying entirely on traditional correspondent-banking networks.
The instruments can also provide households and businesses with an alternative store of value where local currencies are depreciating.
However, widespread use of dollar-backed tokens creates difficult policy questions. It could weaken demand for national currencies, accelerate informal dollarisation and reduce the effectiveness of monetary policy.
Central banks also face challenges in monitoring transactions occurring through offshore platforms and self-controlled digital wallets.
These concerns explain why regulation is becoming as important as adoption.
Authorities must determine how stablecoin issuers, exchanges, wallet providers and onchain financial platforms should be licensed, supervised and required to protect customer assets.
The Financial Action Task Force warned in March 2026 that the rapid expansion of stablecoins and peer-to-peer transfers through unhosted wallets had created new opportunities for criminal misuse. More than 250 stablecoins were circulating by mid-2025, with their combined market capitalisation exceeding US$300.00 billion.
The regulatory task is therefore to distinguish legitimate financial innovation from structures that facilitate money laundering, fraud, sanctions evasion or capital flight.
Industry executives are positioning Africa as an important testing ground for this emerging financial architecture.
WeFi, which describes itself as a provider of blockchain-based infrastructure connecting onchain systems with regulated financial services, is among the companies promoting what it calls the “Deobank” model.
The company says the model uses blockchain for accounting and settlement while regulated partners provide underlying banking services. It also states explicitly that it is not itself a bank and does not accept deposits on its balance sheet.
Its leadership includes Group Chief Executive Maksym Sakharov, whose areas of focus include stablecoins, digital payments and financial infrastructure, and Chairman Reeve Collins, whom the company identifies as a founder and former chief executive of Tether.
The involvement of executives with experience in stablecoin and payment infrastructure reflects growing commercial interest in Africa’s fragmented financial system.
Businesses trading across the continent frequently contend with multiple currencies, foreign-exchange shortages, slow settlements and expensive banking channels. Stablecoins could reduce some of those frictions by enabling near-continuous transfers and programmable settlement.
Their comparative advantage may be strongest in cross-border corridors and other high-friction payment environments rather than ordinary retail transactions, where consumer protection, dispute resolution and acceptance remain weaker than in established card and banking systems.
Stablecoins are not the only response to Africa’s payment challenges.
Central banks are also improving regional settlement infrastructure. South Africa recently added the Angolan kwanza to a Southern African cross-border payment system that had previously relied predominantly on the rand, illustrating efforts to strengthen conventional regional payment rails.
The future is consequently unlikely to involve digital assets replacing banks or national currencies entirely.
Instead, Africa may develop a layered system in which mobile money, commercial banks, regional payment platforms, stablecoins and tokenised deposits serve different customer and commercial needs.
The outcome will depend heavily on regulation.
Overly restrictive rules could push users into informal or offshore markets where authorities have less visibility. Weak regulation, however, could expose consumers to fraud, unstable reserves and the collapse of poorly governed operators.
Africa’s digital asset opportunity is therefore inseparable from its regulatory challenge.
Stablecoins could lower payment barriers and connect businesses to global markets, but their long-term legitimacy will depend on transparent reserves, credible supervision, consumer protection and systems that complement rather than destabilise domestic financial institutions.
