Nigeria is Africa’s largest economy and with a population of over 200 million people, it has the highest interest in Bitcoin globally. According to a recent report released by Google, Nigeria emerged the first amongst other countries around the world in Bitcoin searches on Google.

In the last five years, the number of bitcoin traded by Nigerians was estimated to be 60,215 bitcoins, valued at more than $566 million which is the second-largest volume worldwide. From the beginning of May 2015 to the middle of November 2020, bitcoin trade in Nigeria has increased yearly at least 19% in volume since 2017, and the highest volume (20,504.50) was traded in 2020.

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The amount of BTC/NGN traded daily on Cryptocurrency exchanges ranges between N20 – N25 billion daily, which is at least 4 times the value of trade done on the Nigerian Stock Exchange on most days, which was N5.6 billion as of 5th February, 2021.

According to NBS, it was reported that the capital importation declined by $14.31 Billion Naira in 2020. The total value of capital importation in 2020 was 9.68 billion dollars compared to 23.99 billion dollars that was recorded in 2019.

On February 5, 2021, the Central Bank of Nigeria(CBN) banned the trading of crypto currency in Nigeria.