Status : Launched
Usecase : Retail
Nigeria launched Africa’s first digital currency, the eNaira in October 2021. At the time of launch, the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria announced that five hundred million eNaira (1.21 million dollars) has already been minted. A phased approach was adopted to the rollout. During the initial phase, only bank account holders could access the eNaira. The next phase includes expansion to the unbanked, with unstructured supplementary service data and offline payments to be released in the medium term. As of December 2021, over six hundred thousand eNaira wallets have been created and more than thirty-five thousand transactions have taken place. Currently, 90 percent of transactions are between people and businesses. Based on the level of identity provided, a higher transaction limit for the eNaira is allowed. With a phone number and verified national identity, users can make payments of up to 50,000 Naira ($121) a day, rising to 200,000 ($484) for the lower level of bank-approved account. As of October 2022, transactions value has risen to just under 18 million USD, 919,000 customers have been onboarded, and 700,000 transactions have taken place. The Nigerian central bank has minted 3 billion eNaira with 2.1 billion issued to financial institutions. 33 commercial banks have been integrated into the eNaira infrastructure.
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