BitcoinKE

India has ordered Apple and Google to remove Bitchat, an offline messaging application developed by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, from their Indian app stores under Section 69A of the Information Technology Act, 2000, citing concerns over its ability to enable anonymous communications outside conventional telecom networks.

REGULATION | Apple Removes Jack Dorsey’s BitChat from India App Store After Government Demand

Apple’s App Review team told Dorsey in an email on Saturday that Bitchat “will be removed from the India App Store” following a demand from India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), according to a copy posted by Dorsey on X.
By the same day, the application was no longer available on Google Play in India, while Bitchat’s website was reportedly inaccessible on several Indian networks.
Neither MeitY, Apple nor Google has publicly commented on the removal.
Bitchat uses Bluetooth to allow nearby phones to communicate directly, with messages relayed from one device to another across a mesh network. The application does not require a SIM card, phone number or internet connection, while private messages are encrypted end to end.
The technology attracted heightened attention in India after mobile internet access was suspended around a student protest in central Delhi in July.
Indian downloads of Bitchat increased 32-fold on July 19 2026, while India accounted for about 85% of the application’s global downloads between July 17 and July 23, compared with roughly 1% in the preceding month.
On July 23 2026, the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), part of the Home Ministry, issued a notice to GitHub naming three repositories associated with the application and giving the platform three hours to act.

REGULATION | India Orders Github Takedown of Jack Dorsey’s Bitchat Following Protests

The notice cited Bitchat’s ability to facilitate anonymous communication without registration or phone-number verification and without central logs, saying this impeded lawful interception and allowed the application to continue operating during internet shutdowns.
The application’s code was subsequently copied to other locations while daily users in India exceeded 330,000 the following day.
The government later invoked Section 69A, which allows authorities to order the blocking of public access to information on grounds including the sovereignty and integrity of India, defence and security of the state, public order and prevention of incitement to cognizable offences.
The provision was upheld by India’s Supreme Court in the 2015 Shreya Singhal v. Union of India judgment, which also established procedural safeguards around blocking orders.
The Bitchat case highlights a challenge for Indian authorities because conventional lawful interception measures generally rely on identifiable telecom operators, subscriber information, and centralised communications records.
Bitchat’s decentralised design removes many of those points of control allowing devices to communicate directly over Bluetooth and relay messages between nearby phones.
The application’s reach, however, remains geographically limited by the range of Bluetooth communications and the density of participating devices.
Bitchat was previously removed from Apple’s App Store in China after authorities there ordered its removal under rules covering services capable of “social mobilisation.”

REGULATION | BitChat Removed from the China Apple App Store Due to ‘Illegal Content’

India is also seeking to establish greater control over communications technologies that operate outside traditional telecom infrastructure.
The removal of Bitchat comes as India continues to regulate Starlink, the satellite internet service operated by Elon Musk’s SpaceX. Starlink has agreed to requirements including
establishing gateways in India,
keeping user data in the country, and
providing interception capabilities,
but its final security clearance remained pending as of June 2026.
For iPhone users, removing Bitchat from the App Store effectively prevents normal installation of the application. Android users can potentially install the publicly available software from outside Google Play.
Android devices accounted for roughly three-quarters of Bitchat downloads in India in July 2026, according to the figures cited in the analysis.
The episode also raises questions about the use of internet shutdowns in India. Bitchat’s share of global downloads rose from about 1% before the July shutdowns to 85% during the week when internet access was disrupted around the Delhi protest.
Bitchat’s underlying mesh technology could also have applications beyond protest communications, including disaster response in areas where mobile networks have been disrupted by floods, cyclones or other emergencies.
The case therefore places India’s security concerns against a broader question over how governments regulate decentralised communication tools that can operate without conventional telecom infrastructure.


How BitChat is Used to Keep Everyone Connected During Internet Blackouts




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Apple has removed the offline messaging application, BitChat, from its India App Store following a demand from the country’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Jack Dorsey said in an X post.

“Government of India officially removes BitChat from the App Store,” the app’s developer and Twitter (now X) Co-Founder, Jack Dorsey, wrote in his post, alongside a screenshot of what appeared to be a notice from Apple’s App Review team.

government of India officially removes bitchat from the App Store https://t.co/9oHHiwquec
— jack (@jack) October 3, 2026
BitChat, built by Dorsey, had come under government scrutiny in July 2026 as well, when the Home Ministry’s cybercrime arm, the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre, had ordered GitHub to remove the Bluetooth-based messaging application.

REGULATION | India Orders Github Takedown of Jack Dorsey’s Bitchat Following Protests

Dorsey tagged Apple’s latest notice in his post. In the notice, Apple said the app would be removed “per demand from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY)” and because “it includes content that is illegal in India”.

“We are writing to notify you that your application, per demand from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), will be removed from the India App Store because it includes content that is illegal in India, which is not in compliance with the App Review Guidelines,” the attached notice said.

REGULATION | BitChat Removed from the China Apple App Store Due to ‘Illegal Content’

The relevant section of Apple’s guidelines requires applications to comply with all legal requirements in the locations where they are offered. Developers are responsible for understanding and complying with local laws in addition to Apple’s own guidelines.
According to the notice shared by Dorsey, MeitY issued the takedown demand under Section 69(A) of the Information Technology Act, 2000. Apple said the developer could contact the ministry directly for more information about the removal or Indian laws and requirements.
The app remains available in the App Stores of other territories selected by the developer in App Store Connect, Apple said.

“The TestFlight version of this app will also be unavailable for external and internal testing in India, and all public TestFlight links will no longer be functional,” it said.

BitChat had previously drawn government action in July 2026 when the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre ordered Microsoft subsidiary, GitHub, to remove the application during protests by the Cockroach Janta Party over alleged exam paper leaks.

“The Government of India does not like technologies like BitChat and wants it taken down,” Dorsey had said in an X post at the time while tagging a copy of the July 23 notice.

REGULATION | Uganda Communications Commission Director Says Its ‘Very Easy’ for Government to Switch Off BitChat

In that notice, I4C said BitChat enables communication even during network restrictions and creates a substantial risk of misuse by anti-national elements, terrorist organisations, organised criminal groups, and cybercriminals seeking to evade lawful detection and continue communication despite legally imposed restrictions.

Protests in Madagascar Trigger Surge in Downloads for BitChat, a Decentralized Messaging App

The July 2026 notice followed the use of Bluetooth-based messaging applications by several protesters at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi despite temporary government-imposed restrictions on internet services around the protest site.
According to I4C, because communications occur directly between nearby devices through a decentralised mesh network, BitChat could be used to evade lawful surveillance, facilitate anonymous coordination, and circumvent restrictions imposed by authorities during situations involving public disorder, riots, terrorism, organised crime, or internet shutdowns.

“Intelligence inputs indicate that such decentralised communication platforms are capable of being exploited for coordinating unlawful assemblies, violent protests, dissemination of misinformation, radicalisation, criminal conspiracies, and other activities prejudicial to the sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of the State, public order, and for facilitating the commission of cognizable offences,” the earlier notice had said.

The notice also said the absence of a centralised service provider limits law enforcement agencies’ ability to obtain subscriber information, communication records, or timely assistance during investigations.
The application’s design, which enables communication even during network restrictions, creates a substantial risk of misuse by anti-national elements, terrorist organisations, organised criminal groups, and cybercriminals seeking to evade lawful detection and continue communication despite legally imposed restrictions, the notice said, citing violations of Sections 43, 84B and 84C of the IT Act and Section 61 read with 196 and 197.


GEOPOLITICS | Global Instability a Key Catalyst in Driving Decentralized Communications



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A dispute between cross-chain protocols THORChain and NEAR Intents over the handling of funds stolen in the $387.7 million BitGet hack has highlighted a growing divide in the crypto industry over how far permissionless systems should go in preventing illicit transactions.

MILESTONE | BitGet Says Stolen Funds Nearing $400 Million as Security Breach Unfolds

About $387.5 million of stolen assets began moving across blockchains after the September 24 2026 BitGet breach, with some funds routed through THORChain. BitGet CEO, Gracy Chen, urged THORChain to block addresses linked to the attacker but the protocol declined arguing that selectively blocking transactions would conflict with its permissionless design.

REALITY CHECK | Why BitGet Hacker Used THORChain to Move Stolen Funds

THORChain developer, Boone Wheeler, said a truly permissionless protocol cannot intervene based on the provenance of funds because doing so would make it permissioned. The protocol had previously faced criticism after funds linked to the $1.2 billion ByBit hack were moved through its network.

CRYPTO CRIME | ByBit Sues North Korea Over the $1.5 Billion Hack in 2025, Secures Asset Freeze

NEAR Intents took a different approach.

Its automated SHIELD security system identified more than $50 million in attempted flows linked to the BitGet hack and blocked about $503,000 during execution, while $166,000 passed through, according to the report. NEAR said its system uses onchain data, internal anti-money-laundering signals and third-party intelligence to identify suspicious flows.
NEAR General Manager, Alex Shevchenko, said the underlying NEAR blockchain remains permissionless but individual applications built on it do not necessarily have to process every transaction. The approach has drawn criticism from advocates of strict censorship resistance who argue that intervention undermines the meaning of a permissionless system.

The debate also exposes a practical distinction between decentralised infrastructure and applications operating on top of it.

CASE STUDY | How This Hack Set a Precedent for Freezing Stolen Stablecoins Without Legal Request

THORChain maintains that it has no mechanism to screen individual addresses or transactions while acknowledging that its network can halt activity during protocol-level emergencies.
NEAR, meanwhile, argues that automated controls can protect users and the wider ecosystem without relying on manual intervention by a compliance team.
The dispute reflects a broader question for the crypto industry as decentralised financial infrastructure handles increasingly large sums, whether neutrality should remain absolute when protocols can identify stolen funds, or whether protecting users and preventing money laundering justifies targeted intervention.
The answer could shape how cross-chain protocols balance censorship resistance, security, and regulatory expectations as their role in the digital-asset economy grows.


CRYPTO CRIME | Why BitGet Hacker Was Able to Move Over $80 Million in Stolen XRP




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Ethereum layer-2 network, Blast, will shut down after more than two years of operations saying the cost of maintaining the blockchain has exceeded the revenue it generates.
Blast said that it saw no credible path to making the network economically sustainable and would wind down operations. Its total value locked (TVL) has fallen to about $32 million from a peak of more than $2.2 billion in June 2024, a decline of about 98%, according to DeFiLlama data.


The network’s revenue from usage fell to about $1,793 in September 2026 from a peak of roughly $3.5 million in June 2024, according to DeFiLlama data. Its BLAST token dropped by almost 50% following the shutdown announcement and is down about 98% from its launch.

The $BLAST token tanks following the @blast #Ethereum L2 shutdown announcement. pic.twitter.com/u99EScb0sv
— BitKE (@BitcoinKE) October 3, 2026
Blast attracted more than $1.1 billion in deposits even before its mainnet launched in February 2024, helped by its native-yield offering and expectations of a token airdrop. The network’s TVL later surpassed $2 billion, with nearly 200,000 early-access users.

MILESTONE | Newly Launched Ethereum Layer 2, Blast, Draws Over $500 Million in Deposits in a Few Days

The shutdown comes as competition among Ethereum layer-2 networks increases and major crypto platforms including Coinbase and Robinhood develop their own blockchain networks adding pressure on smaller networks to generate sufficient activity and revenue to cover operating and security costs.

MILESTONE | Robinhood Chain Overtakes Ethereum in Daily Revenue 2 Months After Launch

Blast has asked users to withdraw their assets to Ethereum’s mainnet. Withdrawals will temporarily pause while the network unwinds assets held through Lido, a process expected to take about a week.
Users will be able to withdraw through Blast’s interface until October 26 2026. After that, assets will remain accessible but users will need to interact directly with Blast’s bridge contracts on Ethereum.


REALITY CHECK | Former Leading Web3 Gaming Studio Shuts Down After Onchain Gaming Bet Fails




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A trade group representing U.S. community banks has sued the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) arguing that the regulator exceeded its authority by allowing cryptocurrency firms to obtain national trust bank charters.
The Independent Community Bankers of America (ICBA), which represents banks typically holding less than $10 billion in assets, filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. It is seeking to overturn an OCC rule and related guidance that facilitate applications for national trust charters by crypto firms.

REGULATION | The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) Clears National Banks to Act as Intermediaries in Crypto Transactions

The ICBA said the charters give crypto companies the credibility associated with a federal bank charter without subjecting them to the same regulatory requirements as traditional banks including
capital and liquidity standards,
consolidated supervision,
Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. insurance, and
Community Reinvestment Act obligations.

“American consumers reasonably expect a federally chartered bank to carry federal protections,” ICBA President and CEO, Rebeca Romero Rainey, said in a statement.

REGULATION | Minnesota State Signs Law Permitting Banks, Credit Unions to Offer Crypto Custody Services

The lawsuite comes 7 months after the Bank Policy Institute (BOI), a lobbying group representing some of the largest U.S. banks, said it was considering legal action against the OCC over the regulator’s move to grant national trust bank charters to crypto and fintech firms.
The BPI similarly argued that the OCC has reinterpreted federal licensing rules in a way that could allow crypto companies to enter the U.S. banking system without the same level of oversight applied to traditional banks.

REGULATION | U.S. Banking Lobby Weighs Lawsuit Against OCC Over Crypto Trust Charters

National trust bank charters allow companies to hold and manage assets for customers and facilitate payment settlement but do not permit them to accept traditional cash deposits or make loans.
The OCC said in February 2026 that its rule clarified the longstanding authority of national banks limited to trust-company operations to conduct certain non-fiduciary activities. The rule took effect on April 1 2026.
The regulator has since approved or conditionally approved several applications from crypto and fintech firms.

PRESS RELEASE | Office of the Comptroller of the Currency Announces Conditional Approvals for Five National Trust Bank Charter Applications

OCC Comptroller, Jonathan Gould, said in August 2026 that the agency had received 40 applications for new bank charters since President Donald Trump took office with 23 business plans involving some form of digital-asset activity.
The ICBA argues that expanding national trust charters to crypto firms creates an uneven regulatory environment between traditional community banks and companies offering banking-related services without equivalent safeguards.
The OCC declined to comment on the lawsuit.


CLARITY ACT | American Banks Need Regulatory Clarity More Than Crypto Companies, Says Former CFTC Chairman




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Lloyds Banking Group has published a survey showing that tokenisation could reshape financial services as institutions increase investment on on-chain infrastructure and digital assets.
71% of senior decision-makers at the UK’s largest financial institutions expect tokenisation to reshape the future of financial services, according to Lloyds’ annual Financial Institutions Sentiment Survey. The survey covered 100 senior executives across
banks,
insurers,
financial sponsors, and
asset and wealth managers.

TOKENIZATION | CEO of America’s Largest Bank Urges Acceleration Towards Tokenization to Avoid Falling Behind

Tokenisation allows assets such as cash, bonds, and funds to be represented digitally on-chain potentially enabling faster settlement, automated transactions, and more efficient management of collateral and liquidity.
Faster payments and settlement were identified as the biggest potential benefit cited by 60% of respondents, followed by
collateral and liquidity management at 41%.

EXPERT OPINION | Tokenization Works Best When Applied to Assets People Already Use at Scale

Lloyds said these efficiencies could release capital and liquidity currently tied up in financial transactions for other uses.
Investment in emerging technology is also accelerating.
77% of institutions surveyed said such investment is now a growth priority, up from 41% in 2025, while
64% expect to increase capital expenditure over the next 12 months.
Lloyds said modernising financial and market infrastructure was also viewed by respondents as one of the UK’s biggest economic opportunities over the coming year.

“Financial institutions have spent years modernising how customers interact with financial services.
Increasingly, attention is turning to the infrastructure behind those experiences. Tokenisation is a key part of that shift, with organisations exploring how it can help them transact in a safe, trusted environment, improve efficiency, make better use of capital and enable new products and services.
Those that can turn that potential into real-world solutions stand to gain the greatest advantage,” said Lisa Francis, Global Head of CIB Coverage at Lloyds.

FUNDING | Leading Crypto Brokerage Infrastructure Provider Raises Over $100 Million to Expand On-Chain Stocks

The bank has been testing tokenisation in live financial markets. In early 2026, Lloyds completed the UK’s first public-blockchain transaction using tokenised deposits to purchase a tokenised gilt working with Archax and the Canton Network.
The findings come as Lloyds expands its work on tokenised deposits and digital securities including 3 live tokenised deposit transactions under Project Agorá covering sterling, euros and Swiss francs, including a cross-currency transaction linking FX conversion, payment, and settlement in a single flow.

EXPERT OPINION | Tokenization Alone Will Not Fix Illiquid Assets, Say Industry Experts

“The real opportunity is to make financial markets work faster, more efficiently and with greater flexibility for clients.
Faster settlement, more efficient use of collateral and better movement of liquidity are tangible benefits that boost balance sheets.
The next phase is about turning those individual use cases into infrastructure that works at scale, with the interoperability and common standards needed to connect digital and traditional markets,” said Rob Hale, Co-Head of Global Markets at Lloyds.


TOKENIZATION | Robinhood Chain’s Tokenized Assets Surge 5x as OnChain Stock Trading Accelerates




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BNB Chain has become the first blockchain to surpass $1 billion in tokenized stocks and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) as demand for on-chain versions of traditional financial assets continues to grow.
Tokenized stocks and ETFs on BNB Chain reached about $1.1 billion representing roughly 30% of a broader market worth $3.7 billion, according to data from Token Terminal.
The broader market capitalization of tokenized stocks and ETFs rose about 17% in September 2026 to $3.35 billion, from $2.87 billion in August 2026, Token Terminal data showed. Binance Research, using RWA.xyz data, put the tokenized-stock market above $3 billion in late September 2026.


Ethereum ranked second with about $828 million, or 22% of the market, while Solana held about $738 million, or 20%, according to public data.
BNB Chain also led by the number of addresses holding tokenized stocks with about 1.8 million addresses, representing 45% of the total, according to Binance Research. The network hosts products including Binance bStocks and tokenized securities from Ondo Global Markets.


The growth marks a sharp shift from the start of 2026.
Tokenized stocks and ETFs have expanded more than 5x from about $719 million in January 2026 when BNB Chain accounted for roughly 13% of the market, according to Token Terminal data.
The rise comes as tokenized equities become a larger part of onchain trading.
Binance Research said tokenized-stock transfers exceeded $100 billion in the Q3 2026 compared with about $6 billion in the Q1 2026 while their share of decentralized exchange activity averaged 11% in September 2026.


The trend is also developing alongside regulatory changes.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in September 2026 introduced a 5-year exemption for certain platforms trading tokenized stocks while requiring eligible tokenized securities to provide the same shareholder rights as traditional shares.


STATISTICS | Tokenized Stock Transfer Volume Jump by Over 400% in August 2026




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Anchorage Digital, the federally chartered U.S. digital-asset bank and crypto custodian, has cut 17% of its workforce as a prolonged downturn in cryptocurrency markets puts pressure on the industry.
Chief Executive, Nathan McCauley, informed employees of the layoffs this week, according to The Information, which cited people familiar with the matter. Anchorage had about 400 employees globally as of February 2026 meaning the reduction would amount to roughly 68 positions if its headcount had remained at that level.
The cuts after the company undertook a similar workforce reduction 4 years ago that saw 20% of its staff laid off despite securing $350 million in Series D funding in 2021. At that time, Anchorage Digital was the sole federally-chartered crypto bank in the United States.

Anchorage Digital, the Sole Federally Chartered Crypto Bank in the United States, Cuts Workforce by 20% as Pressure Piles

The cuts come despite Anchorage continuing to expand its institutional digital-asset business.

The company was the first crypto firm to receive a national trust charter from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency in 2021 and has since developed a major custody operation serving institutional clients.
Anchorage was valued at about $4.2 billion in early 2026 (up from $3 billion in 2021) after Tether invested $100 million in the company. It has also expanded into stablecoin infrastructure including serving as the issuer of Tether’s U.S.-focused USAT stablecoin.

INSTITUTIONAL | Anchorage Brings Tokenized Uranium into Institutional Custody

The workforce reduction highlights the pressure facing crypto companies even as institutional adoption and regulated digital-asset infrastructure continue to expand.

REALITY CHECK | Crypto Leverage and Perpetuals Pioneer, BitMEX, to Wind Down Operations After 11 Years in Operation

Anchorage has not publicly disclosed the exact number of employees affected.


Silvergate, a Key Crypto Bank in the United States, to Shut Down and Liquidate




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ABSA Group has become the first African bank to offer institutional digital-asset custody moving into a market that is gaining traction as traditional financial institutions expand into cryptocurrencies and tokenised assets.
The Johannesburg-based lender said its ABSA Digital Asset Custody service is initially available to institutional clients in South Africa, including
asset managers,
non-bank financial institutions, and
corporates.
The service provides the
safekeeping,
administration, and
transfer
of digital assets within a regulated banking environment.
The new service comes exactly one year after Ripple announced a strategic partnership with ABSA bank to provide digital asset custody to the bank’s customers in South Africa.

PRESS RELEASE | Ripple Brings Institutional Digital Asset Custody to South Africa in Partnership with One of Africa’s Leading Financial Institutions

The platform currently supports Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP Ledger and USDC, with ABSA planning to add other assets as demand develops. Bitcoin is currently the pre-dominant asset held in custody, said Rob Downes, Head of Digital Assets at ABSA’s Corporate and Investment Banking Unit.


ABSA said it received regulatory approval in South Africa for the service and plans to extend it to additional client segments and other African markets subject to regulatory approvals.

The bank’s custody infrastructure was developed with digital-asset technology provider, Ripple.

ABSA said the service uses secure hardware environments, layered authorisation, and governance controls to protect digital-asset private keys and provide recovery mechanisms.
The move comes as the value of crypto assets held by South Africa’s 3 largest licensed crypto service providers:
LUNO,
VALR, and
OVEX
more than doubled to 25.3 billion Rand ($1.5 billion) by the end of 2024 from less than 10 billion Rand at the start of 2023, according to the South African Reserve Bank.

According to @SAReserveBank, due to their exclusively digital borderless nature, crypto assets can be used to circumvent Exchange Control Regulations.
On-chain analysis confirms since January 2019, the top 10 domestically-hosted $BTC wallets have processed ~R63 billion. pic.twitter.com/GgArRVE8wd
— BitKE (@BitcoinKE) November 26, 2025
The worldwide custody market is valued at roughly $953.5 billion by 2026, and is projected to grow to as much as $4.38 trillion by 2033.

REGULATION | Europe Now Has Over 300 MiCA-Approved Crypto Firms – Custody Services Dominate at ~70%

ABSA’s move also gives the bank infrastructure that could support wider digital-asset services, including
tokenisation,
digital securities,
stablecoins, and
digital payments,
although the current offering is focused on institutional custody rather than retail cryptocurrency services.
The development marks a shift in the African digital-asset market with regulated banks beginning to provide infrastructure traditionally supplied by specialist crypto firms.


INSTITUTIONAL | South African Stablecoin, ZARU, Adds ABSA as Second Major Banking Partner




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Singapore’s crypto economy grew 55.4% to $284 billion in the year ended June 2026 making it the largest measured crypto market in Central and Southeast Asia and Oceania despite a broader regional contraction, blockchain analytics firm, Chainalysis, has said.
The growth was led by institutional platforms where activity rose 94% to $60 billion. The activity was concentrated among market makers, over-the-counter trading firms, and institutional brokerages, Chainalysis said.
The broader Central and Southeast Asia and Oceania region contracted 6.8% during the period. Singapore, however, recorded growth across major areas of crypto activity, including
a 30% increase in flows through centralized exchanges, and
a 69% rise in decentralized exchange activity.

REPORT | The 2026 Global Crypto Adoption Index by Chainalysis

Chainalysis said the increase in institutional activity was largely driven by high-volume trading on existing platforms rather than a rapid expansion in the number of new services.
Institutional platforms across the wider region processed $152.3 billion during the period, up 40% from a year earlier. Singapore accounted for the largest share of that activity with institutional growth significantly outpacing the 19% increase recorded across the rest of the region.


The shift comes as Singapore combines tighter digital-asset regulation with efforts to develop tokenisation, stablecoins, and on-chain settlement infrastructure. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has also supported trials involving regulated stablecoins and tokenised bank money.
Chainalysis said stablecoins are increasingly being used for cross-border transactions across the region. Cross-border stablecoin activity was 3.2 times larger than domestic activity across the markets studied reflecting demand for faster and potentially lower-cost international settlement.
The data points to a market increasingly divided between institutional financial activity in Singapore and more payment-oriented crypto use elsewhere in Southeast Asia.
The Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam recorded 5.4 million small-value peer-to-peer transfers of less than $10,000 during the period representing 14.4% of the global total despite the three countries accounting for only 2.5% of global crypto activity.


More than 4 in 5 domestic transfers were below $1,000.
Singapore’s figures therefore show a different pattern of crypto adoption with institutional trading, market infrastructure, and cross-border financial applications playing a growing role alongside retail activity.


REPORT | P2P Activity in Africa Led Crypto Adoption in H1 2026, Says Chainalysis




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A British businessman and his pregnant wife were subjected to a violent home invasion in which masked attackers beat the man with hammers and threatened to kill his unborn child unless he transferred hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of cryptocurrency.

The couple, who have remained anonymous, described the incident to the BBC as ‘horrific’.

The attackers forced their way into the home, assaulted the businessman, and threatened his heavily pregnant wife before making him transfer his crypto savings. They also took several luxury Rolex watches before escaping in a getaway car.
The case is notable, not only because of the amount stolen, but because it provides a rare, detailed account of what a so-called crypto wrench attack looks like from the victim’s perspective.
Unlike a conventional crypto hack, there was no need to compromise a wallet, exploit a smart contract, or steal a private key remotely. The attackers targeted the person who controlled the assets and used physical violence to make him authorize the transfer.
The BBC reported that one of the attackers was directing the others over a video call during the robbery. The businessman recalled hearing the man tell his accomplices: ‘You can have 10 grand each but I am taking the rest.’
That detail points to an increasingly organized form of crypto crime in which attackers can combine physical surveillance, personal information, and violence with the ability to move digital assets almost instantly.

REALITY CHECK | Lack of On-Chain Privacy Risks Holding Back Business, Corporate Payments, Says Founder, Binance

The Rise of the Wrench Attack
Wrench attacks refer to crimes in which crypto holders are physically threatened, kidnapped, assaulted, or otherwise coerced into surrendering their assets.
The term highlights a fundamental vulnerability of self-custodied cryptocurrency where the strongest cryptographic protections cannot prevent someone from being forced to unlock an account or approve a transaction.
An August 2026 report from TRM Labs and London’s Metropolitan Police identified 17 reported wrench attacks in London between March and December 2024.
Kidnapping accounted for 59% of those cases,
aggravated burglary 35%, and
robbery 6%,
with an average crypto asset loss of about $880, 000 per incident. The report said such attacks are almost certainly underreported.

CRYPTO CRIME | Almost 60% of Wrench Attacks Are Kidnappings, Says a 2026 Report by TRM Labs and London Police Service

The threat has since expanded beyond a small number of isolated cases. CertiK recorded 52 verified wrench attacks globally in the first half of 2026, involving about $124.1 million in exposed crypto assets. Home invasions accounted for 20 cases, making them the largest category in its dataset.

2025 RECAP | Physical Wrench Attacks on Crypto Holders Surge 75% in 2025 Causing Millions in Losses, Says CertiK Report
Security has Moved from the Wallet to the Person
The UK case exposes an uncomfortable consequence of crypto’s defining feature – control over assets can ultimately depend on control over the individual holding the keys.
For most cryptocurrency theft, the attacker is somewhere else in the world, exploiting software, social engineering, or compromised credentials. In a wrench attack, the distance disappears.
The victim is confronted directly.
That creates a different security problem for crypto holders particularly those publicly associated with large balances or who can be identified through blockchain activity, social media, or other sources of personal information.

CRYPTO CRIME | Nigeria Police Force Dismisses 5 Inspectors Over Alleged Kidnappings and Crypto Theft

CertiK has described a shift toward more targeted attacks with criminals using information about potential victims and, increasingly, their relatives to apply pressure.
The British couple’s account therefore offers something that statistics alone cannot which is a detailed picture of what happens when cryptocurrency crime leaves the blockchain and enters the home.
The money may move through a digital transaction in seconds.
For the person forced to make that transaction, the consequences can last much longer.


CRYPTO CRIME | France Takes ‘Preventative Measures’ Following Increased Crypto Wrench Attacks




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Operating profits at South Korea’s cryptocurrency exchanges fell nearly 78% in the first half of 2026 as
lower bitcoin prices,
weaker trading activity, and
a shift of retail investors into domestic equities
squeezed one of the world’s largest digital asset markets.

MARKET ANALYSIS | ‘There is No Retail Interest in Crypto Right Now,’ Say Analysts

Data released by South Korean financial regulators showed the total value of crypto assets held on domestic exchanges fell 33% to 58.9 trillion won ($42 billion) by the end of June 2026, down from 87.2 trillion Won at the end of 2025. Average daily trading volumes also declined to 3.1 trillion Won from 5.4 trillion Won over the same period.

Data collected from VASPs in South Korea shows average daily trding volume was down 44% and total deposits in Korean Won was down 35% in H1 2026.#CryptoKR #CryptoSouthKorea #CryptoAsia #CryptoReality pic.twitter.com/0QKrwqnrYQ
— BitKE (@BitcoinKE) October 2, 2026
The drop in exchange earnings reflects the structure of South Korea’s crypto market where trading fees remain the main source of revenue. When prices fall and retail activity slows, exchange profits can contract sharply.
Bitcoin’s decline during the first half of the year weighed heavily on sentiment while expectations for interest rate cuts faded amid inflation concerns and global economic uncertainty making investors more cautious toward risk assets.

REALITY CHECK | Bitcoin Still Trading 50% Below All-Time High Over Half a Year Later

At the same time, South Korean retail investors shifted capital into a booming domestic stock market, particularly AI-related shares and leveraged exchange-traded products tied to companies such as Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.
That stock-market frenzy diverted trading volumes away from cryptocurrencies.

REALITY CHECK | South Korea Crypto Trading Volumes Collapse by ~90% YoY as Stock Market Outperforms Digital Assets

Major exchanges such as Upbit and Bithumb reported revenue declines of around 50% with Bithumb posting losses partly due to lower trading income and markdowns on crypto holdings. Customer deposits on exchanges also fell indicating investors were committing less capital to digital assets.
The slowdown highlights a broader reality for crypto exchanges globally where, despite growing institutional adoption and regulatory progress, exchange earnings remain closely tied to market cycles. During periods of lower volatility and declining prices, retail trading activity, which is the industry’s primary revenue engine, can dry up quickly.


REALITY CHECK | Why Protocols Generating Over $10 Million in Monthly Fees Fell by Half YoY in H1 2026




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NEAR Intents, a cross-chain crypto trading protocol, lost about $3.8 million in cryptocurrency after an attacker exploited a vulnerability in its infrastructure adding to a growing list of crypto hacks in 2026.
The attacker stole the funds by exploiting a bug involving NEAR Intents’ Omni deposit and withdrawal infrastructure and its smart contract, according to the project. NEAR Intents subsequently suspended deposits and withdrawals across 11 blockchain networks including BNB Chain, Polygon and Optimism, while it investigated the incident.

CRYPTO MARKETS | NEAR Surges ~80% in a Week as Privacy Trading Drives Intents Activity

The protocol said the vulnerability has been fixed and that it would fully reimburse users whose funds were stolen. It is also working with law enforcement and blockchain analytics firms to trace the stolen assets.
Blockchain investigator, ZachXBT, said the stolen funds were moved to KuCoin before being bridged to Bitcoin.
The exploit comes after NEAR Intents recently helped block a $50 million swap involving funds stolen from crypto exchange, BitGet, underscoring the security risks facing infrastructure used to move assets across multiple blockchains.
NEAR Intents says it has processed more than $30 billion in transaction volume across 35 blockchain networks. The protocol said it will publish a detailed post-mortem of the $3.8 million theft.


CRYPTO CRIME | Crypto Hacks Surpass $700 Million in September Making it Worst Month of 2026 So Far




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Walapay, global payments infrastructure for account issuance, collections, FX, and payouts, has announced a $4.6 million seed round led by
Generative Ventures,
with participation from
Commerce Ventures,
Polygon,
Verda Ventures,
NGC Ventures,
FGV Capital,
AAF,
Jsquare,
Knollwood,
Big Brain Holdings
and others.
Founded by brothers Tom and Dimitri Borgers, WalaPay gives enterprises, fintechs, payment service providers (PSPs), and financial institutions a single API to move money across currencies and geographies with direct local rail integrations across
Latin America,
Africa, and
Asia.


The company already processes $2.5 billion in annualized TPV, working with customers including Kast, Nuvei, and Bastion.
“Payments infrastructure breaks down at the last mile, where money has to land in a local account, in a local currency, through a local bank.
Walapay is a rare team building that full stack themselves, owning the licensing and banking relationships instead of renting them, and using whichever rails move money fastest and cheapest. We’re thrilled to back Tom, Dimitri, and the team as they bring more of global payment volume onto rails built for how money can move on modern rails,” said Lex Sokolin, Managing Partner at Generative Ventures.
“We’re always looking for teams tackling structural gaps in underserved parts of financial services, and cross-border payments is exactly that; still slow, expensive, and stitched together with rented licenses in most emerging markets,” said Vivek Krishnamurthy, Partner at Commerce Ventures.
“Walapay is one of the rare platforms we’ve seen with real local rail coverage across Latin America, Africa, and Asia, and we’ve watched their customers get measurable speed and cost improvements from putting volume through it.”
The gap Walapay is built to close is structural.
Most global payment platforms stop at the correspondent bank; they never touch the last mile where money actually has to land in a local account, in local currency, through a local bank. That gap gets filled with third-party licenses, aggregator partners, and margin extracted in the middle which adds up to slower settlement, less control, and compliance risk that businesses don’t fully own. In practice, a single cross-border payment today often passes through four or five separate banks and payment service providers before it settles each one adding its own fees, delays, and points of failure.
Walapay is built to collapse that chain into one platform it owns end to end cutting the handoffs that make cross-border payments slower and less reliable as a business expands into new markets.
“Walapay is the kind of company we started Verda to fund: infrastructure solving a real cross-border payments problem for businesses.
By owning more of the stack, they can bring markets together without the fragmented technology and compliance complexity that has historically made global expansion difficult,” said Alex Witt, Founding General Partner at Verda Ventures.
“We believe next-generation payment rails will become first-class financial infrastructure, but the banking system isn’t going away anytime soon,” said Tom Borgers, Co-Founder and CEO of Walapay.
“It’s important for us to bring both sides together seamlessly, so businesses can move money globally without having to think about the rails underneath.”
Walapay’s platform gives fintechs and PSPs
instant settlement into multicurrency accounts,
real-time repatriation of funds to emerging markets, and
the option to convert idle deposits into yield-generating digital dollar instruments, with yield shared back to the customer.
The company works with banking and digital asset infrastructure partners to support flexible custody models tailored to a customer’s regulatory and operational needs.

“We’ve worked closely with Tom, Dimitri, and the Walapay team for several years and have been consistently impressed by both the speed and quality of their execution,” said Marcos Fernandez, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at FGV Capital.
“Cross-border payments are incredibly complex, and Walapay has done the hard work of building the banking relationships, licensing, compliance infrastructure, and partner network needed to make payments work at scale.
We’re proud to be investors and partners in the company and excited to support the team as they expand into new markets.”
Walapay will use the new funding to
expand its licensing footprint,
deepen banking partnerships, and
grow its team as it works toward bringing more banks and financial institutions directly onto modern payment rails.
The company believes this shift will ultimately collapse layers of intermediation in a global cross-border payments market worth an estimated $190 trillion annually.
Walapay is also built for a new category of demand it expects to grow alongside its existing customer base: AI-native commerce.
As autonomous agents and AI-driven applications increasingly need to transact and move money on their own, they require the same instant, compliant, globally-connected rails that fintechs and PSPs rely on today. Rather than building a narrow, agent-specific payments product, Walapay treats AI-driven money movement as another market its infrastructure is already built to serve.
__________
About Walapay
Walapay is global payments infrastructure built from the rails up.
Through one integration, fintechs, PSPs, and financial institutions can issue multi-currency accounts, collect funds, convert currencies, and pay out globally. Walapay goes deeper into the banking, regulatory, liquidity, and local payment infrastructure behind the markets it serves, helping customers achieve global reach with stronger local execution and fewer infrastructure dependencies.
Walapay is processing $2.5 billion in annualized TPV and operates in 180+ countries, supporting 60+ currencies.
Learn more at walapay.io.
FUNDING | Trace Finance Raises Over $30 Million Series A to Scale Regulated Banking, Stablecoin Infrastructure Across Emerging Markets
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The Stellar Community Fund (SCF) awarded about $4.04 million worth of XLM to 40 projects in its 45th funding round with 5 of those projects explicitly focused on African markets.
The Africa-focused projects span
stablecoin banking,
cross-border payments,
trade finance, and
local-currency settlement,
highlighting the continued emphasis on connecting dollar-denominated digital assets with existing African financial infrastructure.

Kotani Pay Wins $100,000 Grant from the Stellar Development Foundation
Below are the winning projects:

1.) Sorted – $150,000
Sorted is building a stablecoin banking app for users with Android Go, older or basic phones and intermittent connectivity.
The project specifically targets users in Africa and South Asia, seeking to provide access to digital dollars without requiring users to navigate crypto-native wallets, gas fees or bridging.

2.) Minisend — $100,000
Minisend is building a Stellar-based settlement rail that allows users to send USDC and receive local currency through M-PESA, Airtel Money, and bank accounts in Africa.
The project uses Stellar’s anchor standards and Circle’s CCTP infrastructure to connect stablecoins with local payment rails.

@StellarOrg is backing us with $100k grant to keep building.
Stablecoins move across multiple chains, but getting that liquidity into local payment rails can still mean dealing with bridges, gas, fragmented liquidity and P2P.
We’re building Minisend to connect those onchain… pic.twitter.com/ZF4UZJfmYn
— Minisend (@minisendapp) September 30, 2026
3.) Kutana — $97,000
Kutana is a B2B cross-border trade platform for African SMEs.
Its Trade Secure product uses USDC on Stellar for milestone-based escrow, with funds released as trade milestones are completed. The model is aimed at reducing some of the payment and trust frictions involved in cross-border African trade.

4.) Lomi. — $95,000
lomi. is building a Stellar bridge and anchor for XOF/USDC, connecting its payment infrastructure to the eight-country West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA) market.
The integration connects mobile-money and card payments to Stellar-based settlement, giving stablecoins a bridge into Francophone West African payment infrastructure.

PARTNERSHIP | British Actor, Idris Elba, Partners with Stellar Network to Explore Blockchain Solutions for West Africa

5.) SlimePay — $35,000
Slimepay is building a Stellar anchor and merchant settlement rail for African currencies, with its initial infrastructure focused on USDC-to-NGN payments.
The project uses Stellar’s SEP-6, SEP-24 and SEP-31 standards to connect customer accounts and local bank rails to the network.

Taken together, the five projects show a fairly consistent direction for Stellar’s Africa strategy in this funding round.
The focus is not primarily on speculative crypto applications. It is on stablecoin access, local-currency conversion, cross-border settlement and trade infrastructure.
In other words, the common thread is the connection between global digital dollars and existing African financial rails – from M-PESA and Airtel Money to bank accounts, mobile-money networks, and B2B trade.
Five of 40 funded projects represents 12.5% of SCF Round #45, making Africa a notable geographic theme within the cohort.


STABLECOINS | MoneyGram Launches the MGUSD Stablecoin on the Stellar Blockchain




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After almost seven years of training blockchain developers across Africa, Web3Bridge is shifting its focus toward building founders, reflecting a broader change in the economics of the continent’s Web3 industry.
Web3Bridge said it is not shutting down after a September 29 2026 announcement that it had ‘closed up shop’ triggered questions about the fate of the Nigerian training programme. Instead, it said it is moving toward a Founders Residency while continuing developer cohorts.
The organisation said the decision followed changes in the ecosystem, including
projects shutting down,
companies pivoting, and
global blockchain firms reducing or ending parts of their African operations.
Lisk, for example, recently announced a wind-down of its blockchain and investment operations.

REALITY CHECK | Lisk’s Africa Bet Ends as Blockchain Shuts Down

The shift reflects a problem that has become harder for Africa’s Web3 sector to ignore – producing developers does not necessarily produce sustainable businesses.

REPORT | ~90% of 2025 Web3 Funding in Nigeria was Grant-Based

Web3Bridge said it has trained and exposed thousands of people to blockchain over nearly seven years but concluded that technical talent alone was not enough to create companies capable of finding customers, raising capital, and scaling.

REALITY CHECK | Over 80 Crypto Apps Shutter in Q1 2026 as Capital Shifts to Bitcoin ETFs, Stablecoins

Its new residency will therefore focus on founders with support around
product-market fit,
teams,
fundraising,
distribution, and
building investable companies.

The change also points to a broader reset in the sector.

REALITY CHECK | ‘We Made the Wrong Bet on Social,’ Base Blockchain Creator Admits

During the earlier Web3 funding cycle, developer programmes, grants, and hackathons were important mechanisms for bringing new talent and projects into the ecosystem. But as funding becomes more selective and some major ecosystem players retrench, organisations built around training developers increasingly have to demonstrate a clearer path from talent to sustainable businesses.
Web3Bridge’s pivot is effectively an admission that the industry’s next bottleneck may not be the number of people who can build blockchain technology but the number of companies able to turn that talent into durable businesses.

We have come to realise that great technology alone doesn’t build great companies.
We need more founders who understand how to identify problems worth solving, validate markets, build the right teams, find product-market fit, raise capital, understand their numbers, sell, distribute and scale. We need founders who don’t just know how to launch startups, but know how to build investable companies capable of competing globally.

– Web3 Bridge

For Web3Bridge, the question is no longer simply how to train more developers – It is what those developers will build and whether there will be companies capable of employing them when the next funding cycle ends.


REALITY CHECK | Why Protocols Generating Over $10 Million in Monthly Fees Fell by Half YoY in H1 2026




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A U.S. judge has dismissed most claims brought by the Celsius bankruptcy estate against blockchain analytics firm, Chainalysis, but allowed a claim alleging the company aided a breach of fiduciary duty tied to Celsius’ disputed $3.3 billion asset calculation to proceed.
U.S. District Judge, Margaret Garnett, ruled on September 29 2026 that 12 claims should be dismissed with prejudice while three consumer-protection claims were dismissed without prejudice and can be amended by October 20 2026.

The judge denied Chainalysis’ motion to dismiss the first claim allowing it to continue.

The surviving claim centers on Celsius’ December 2020 announcement that it had completed an ‘audit’ confirming $3.318 billion in assets using Chainalysis’ Reactor software.
According to the complaint described in the ruling, a Celsius executive initially calculated about $1.18 billion in assets using Reactor before the methodology was changed and the figure rose to about $3.3 billion. The complaint alleges Chainalysis helped draft, edit, and approve the subsequent press release and knew that describing the work as an audit and independent verification was false or misleading.

Celsius Network Tops Major Crypto Bankrupted Projects in 2022

The court’s ruling does not establish those allegations as facts. For purposes of deciding the motion to dismiss, the court treated the complaint’s well-pleaded allegations as true.
The case puts renewed attention on the role and responsibilities of blockchain analytics companies whose software is increasingly used by exchanges, financial institutions, and government agencies to trace transactions and investigate illicit activity.

That market has expanded sharply.

TRM Labs said recently that more than 600 government agencies and institutions now use its platform while its annual recurring revenue has quadrupled over the past three years using these statistics are proof that it offers a superior product and service over Chainalysis.

MILESTONE | Over 600 Government Agencies and Institutions Now Using TRM Labs to Investigate Crypto Activity

The company has positioned its tools around transaction investigation, criminal-network identification, and tracing illicit funds.

Chainalysis and TRM Labs are also competing for increasingly significant government and institutional business. In August 2026, Chainalysis challenged a roughly $94.7 million U.S. government contract awarded to TRM Labs for cryptocurrency investigative technology and services.
The Celsius litigation therefore comes as blockchain forensics firms have moved from being largely back-office analytics providers to important infrastructure for exchanges, regulators, law enforcement, and financial institutions.
Celsius filed for bankruptcy in July 2022 after freezing customer withdrawals. The lawsuit was brought by the Blockchain Recovery Investment Consortium, the litigation administrator, and recovery manager for the Celsius estate as part of efforts to recover assets for creditors.
The surviving claim alleges that Chainalysis’ involvement gave credibility to Celsius’ asset figures and helped the company’s insiders breach their fiduciary duties. Chainalysis has sought dismissal of the lawsuit. The company has refused to comment on the ruling.

CASE STUDY | This Crypto Crime Could Set a Precedent Leading to Permanent Financial Ban for Founders

The next deadline in the case is October 20 2026 when Celsius’ litigation administrator must either amend the 3 surviving consumer-protection claims or inform the court that it will not do so.
The case leaves one central question for later stages of the litigation – whether a blockchain analytics provider’s role in producing and communicating financial metrics can create legal exposure when those metrics are subsequently used by a crypto company to support claims about its financial position.


REALITY CHECK | TRM Labs vs Chainalysis – Who is Better at Blockchain Forensics?




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Businesses in Nigeria that accept Bitcoin are still seeing customers rely primarily on cash highlighting the gap between cryptocurrency acceptance and its use as an everyday means of payment according to a report by a local outlet.

According to Iwu*, a young businessman in Lagos, Nigeria:
“People with Bitcoin wallets, they come, they will show me their crypto wallets and still pay me in cash or by bank transfer.
A few of them still pay in crypto, but many of them would rather pay with cash instead of transferring crypto.”

REALITY CHECK | Why Cash Still Dominates Many African Economies

The experience reflects a broader challenge for Bitcoin as a payments tool as merchants can make the cryptocurrency available without customers necessarily choosing it at checkout. Bitcoin payment use remains difficult to measure because transactions can involve
payment processors,
crypto cards, and
instant conversion into local currencies.
For merchants, accepting Bitcoin can therefore amount to adding another payment option rather than replacing existing ones. Bitcoin’s payment infrastructure allows businesses to receive BTC directly or use processors that convert the cryptocurrency into local currency, reducing their exposure to price volatility.

“Of all the customers who buy from me, about 30 per cent of them pay in crypto.
Most of them come out of curiosity because of the Bitcoin sign I put up that I accept crypto. They make enquiries.
Some of them end up buying and paying with crypto,” said Iwu.

REPORT | South Africa’s Online Retail Sector Outpacing Physical Retail by 10x – Crypto is Least Preferred Payment Option

The distinction is important for cryptocurrency adoption. Acceptance by merchants establishes the possibility of spending Bitcoin, but actual usage depends on whether consumers have a reason to choose it over cash, mobile money, cards or other established payment methods.

“Bitcoin is a digital asset, and no company owns it.
Therefore, Bitcoin can’t run advertisements for itself. But we that accept it, we are the ones that will do the publicity for it. Many businesses around this area accept crypto payments, but they don’t want to put a signboard outside their shops and offices like me. They treat it as a need-to-know and only if the customer asks to pay Bitcoin.
Crypto payment won’t grow like that,” said Iwu.

OPINION | What Two Weeks Across 2.5 Continents Revealed About Stablecoins in Everyday Life

Iwu says for adoption to take place, regulated digital asset companies in Nigeria need to start running advertisements similar to regulated entities like Opay, MoniePoint, and other payments fintechs.

“Everybody knows what is Bitcoin. They just don’t know how to use it, whether they can use it or if it is safe. We need to educate them, and that is the only way we can make them come around.
When it starts growing, peer pressure will push other people to follow,” said Iwu.


* Names have been changed for privacy reasons.



BITCOIN | How Bitcoin is Powering Over 70 Businesses on the Garden Route in South Africa




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This post is adapted from this original post.

Workers across sub-Saharan Africa are showing strong demand for stablecoin payouts as
limited banking access,
cash-heavy economies, and
cross-border payment friction
create problems for digital workers, according to Stripe.

REALITY CHECK | Why Cash Still Dominates Many African Economies

A Stripe survey of 2,303 people across 20 emerging markets, including
Kenya,
Nigeria, and
South Africa,
found that
68% of independent workers in sub-Saharan Africa would accept stablecoin payouts, while
22% already receive them.
The survey was conducted in late 2025 among gig workers, contractors, creators, freelancers, and marketplace sellers.

STABLECOINS | Over 50% of Global Freelancers Willing to Accept Stablecoin Payouts, Reveals Latest Stripe Survey

Stripe said 40% of Africa’s population remains unbanked and about 90% of financial transactions are conducted in cash. Against that backdrop, 72% of surveyed workers in sub-Saharan Africa said they already receive payouts through digital wallets while 38% identified receiving payments as their primary use case for stablecoins.

STABLECOINS | VISA is Reportedly Piloting Stablecoin Settlements for Cross-Border Mobile Money Payments in The Congo

The findings point to a payments problem rather than purely a cryptocurrency one.

Across the survey, 35% of workers cited high transaction or currency-conversion fees as their biggest payout problem while 26% cited delays. Stripe said international wires can take one to five business days and cost $15-$50 per transaction compared with stablecoin transfers that can settle nearly instantly at a cost of less than 10 cents, citing McKinsey data.

EXPLAINER | How South African Startup, Funti3r, Earns Recurring $5,000 Monthly Using Blockchain to Power the Future of Global Work

For African workers earning from global platforms, stablecoins can also provide access to dollar-denominated balances without requiring a traditional bank account abroad. But adoption still faces barriers:
40% of workers globally cited fraud or security concerns,
39% said they did not know where to acquire stablecoins safely, and
30% said converting them into local currency was difficult.
Stripe’s survey found relatively high confidence in stablecoins among workers in sub-Saharan Africa with 65% agreeing that they are safe to use. The company said the challenge for platforms is therefore increasingly about making stablecoin payouts simple to receive, convert, and spend rather than requiring workers to navigate crypto infrastructure themselves.
The survey covered Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa alongside other emerging markets, but its sub-Saharan Africa figures should not be treated as representative of the entire region. Stripe said country samples were approximately 100 respondents and skewed toward digitally literate, internet-connected populations.


PRESS RELEASE | PayPal Brings PYUSD Stablecoin to Users Across 70 Markets Worldwide and Expands Access in Africa




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European Union (EU) regulators are scrutinizing Binance’s continued access to customers in the bloc after the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange was required to wind down its business for failing to obtain a licence under the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regime, according to a report by the Financial Times (FT).
Binance is reportedly relying on a ‘reverse solicitation’ exemption which allows non-EU financial firms to serve customers who independently initiate a relationship with them. European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) officials have stressed that the exemption is narrowly defined and should not be used to circumvent MiCA licensing requirements.

REGULATION | Binance Users in Europe Can Now Transfer and Withdraw Crypto Assets Following MiCA License Denial

National regulators, including those in
France,
Germany, and
Greece
are examining Binance’s use of the exemption and have sought information from the exchange. Regulators could impose fines or take further enforcement action if they conclude Binance is operating outside the scope of the exemption.

REGULATION | BitPanda Fined €70,000 in Austria’s First Published MiCA Penalty

Binance told the FT it was working toward MiCA authorisation and complies with applicable requirements in the jurisdictions where it operates. Reuters said it could not immediately verify the FT report while Binance and ESMA did not immediately respond to its requests for comment.
The dispute puts reverse solicitation under MiCA under closer scrutiny as regulators seek to prevent firms without EU-wide authorisation from continuing to serve European customers through exemptions intended for limited, customer-initiated relationships.


INSIGHTS | Why a MiCA Licensing Setback for the World’s Largest Exchange Matters




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