Nigeria Leads Bitcoin P2P Trading Across Africa in Q1 2021

Despite the suspension of crypto trading in Nigeria, amidst regulatory works, Nigeria is leading the Bitcoin P2P trading in Africa in the first quarter of 2021.

Between January and March, Nigeria posted a peer-to-peer (P2P) Bitcoin trading value worth $99.1 million, Kenya followed with $38.4 million,( $61 million less than Nigeria’s).

Ghana and South Africa completes the top 4 with $27.4 million and $25.8 million respectively.

Nigeria’s $33.1 million monthly P2P volume is a 28% rise from the $25.8 million per month it posted in 2020.

Experts have attributed the growth of the crypto market in the country to the huge influx of the Nigerian youth population involved in crypto trading.

There are more than 20 cryptocurrency exchanges in Nigeria employing hundreds of young Nigerians and some of the exchanges are founded and run 100 percent by young Nigerians. 

There are also blockchain projects in the country that have many Nigerians working on them. According to data from an Austin-based job search site, there was a 90 percent increase in blockchain, bitcoin, and cryptocurrency job postings between February 2018 and 2019.

Job postings in blockchain categories rose 4,086 percent in the share of job postings per million from the previous three years.