Nigeria Joins Crypto Market, Signs Order for Virtual Asset Council

Nigeria's President Tinubu has signed an executive order to create a Virtual Asset Council, chaired by the central bank and including the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS), to coordinate licensing of digital assets nationwide.

The council is tasked with reconciling Nigeria's enthusiasm for crypto with its regulatory instincts. This move follows five years of regulators trying to ban a market that refused to die, but ultimately joining it.

Nigeria is Africa's largest crypto market and has long needed regulation. Between July 2024 and June 2025 alone, Nigerians conducted $92.1 billion in on-chain transactions, making the country second only to India globally by adoption volume.

The executive order aims to address a monetary-policy headache that even the IMF has been vocal about. The Fund requested that platforms be licensed, reporting thresholds set for large conversions, and the CBN and SEC work from the same rulebook.

A naira-pegged stablecoin, cNGN, issued under Investments and Securities Act (ISA) 2025, is marketed as Africa's first regulated token. This could keep value creation inside the naira system while delivering settlement speed that drove adoption in the first place.