In an attempt to avoid further scrutiny from the Nigerian government, several crypto exchanges suspend their users from purchasing USDT stable coins with the Naira.
Even Binance, one of the largest exchanges in the world, supports the movement as the CBN authority has been mounting pressure on the exchange since the rapid devaluation of the Naira began.
To this effect, the crypto exchanges operating in Nigeria have begun telling their Nigerian customers about the latest developments. Some exchanges sent out emails to their customers about the USDT and USDC Naira issues, while others simply placed it in a notification.
An example of the email is as follows:
“We would like to inform you that * is suspending the purchase and sales of USDT and USDC in Nigeria or with the Naira. In other words, as of this mail, you are suspended from purchasing and selling USDT and USDC using the Nigerian Naira. We are sorry for the inconvenience of this development”
The Nigerian regulators believe that, somehow, crypto exchanges are directly involved in the recent 113% devaluation of the Naira.
This is because crypto exchanges like Binance allow users to fix their prices in P2P transactions and the USDT has been having a high volume of transactions against the Naira for a period, directly affecting the value of the currency, supposedly.
Nigeria’s actions against USDT and stablecoins
According to the CBN governor, Olayemi Cardoso, over $26 billion and counting has passed through Binance Nigeria alone, and the government is not allowed to know the sources and the users.
This is a risky point for Binance as if they fold for the Nigerian government and release user transaction data, which goes against the core principle of the cryptocurrency principle and advantage.
It would create a huge blowback to the company. This a blowback that will not only affect one of the exchange’s largest customer bases, Nigeria but their entire customer base as users will lose trust in the company since anonymity is the key difference between cryptocurrency and traditional banking.
That isn’t the concern of the Nigerian government as reports claim that 2 crypto executives at Binance were arrested earlier this week in a strategy to force the crypto exchange to hand over its user KYC details. This information is currently unconfirmed and will be updated soon.
Some Nigerians look at this move by the government as further ways in which the country is caged from developing as it should since the government had long since forgotten about growing the economy instead, growing their own pockets and enslaving the rest in economic hardship.
The arrests are warning shots for all crypto exchanges in Nigeria to tread carefully as the business is hanging by a thread.
Now, workers are advised not to wear any crypto exchange-related merchandise to avoid attracting attention from security and regulatory officials.
