Author: Kehinde Ojewale

We live in an era of data. In today’s world, data is the new gold. The quality of services now significantly depends on how much insight can be extracted from data to help in the creation of the services. For fintech organizations, building services that harness the power of data and artificial intelligence has now become necessary to ensure that the services are tailored to meet the needs of customers. Artificial intelligence is now being used in various ways to help fintech companies provide intelligent and improved services. Some of the major areas of AI application in fintech are discussed…

Image Credit: Kabiru Yusuf At the epicenter of Africa’s rapidly evolving tech ecosystem lies the fast growing fintech sector. A huge chunk of Africa’s growth in the tech startup scene can be credited to fintech startups. As the proliferation of fintech services grows deeper in this year 2021, fintechs have, once again, led the pace for the growth of Africa’s bubbling tech startup ecosystem. The first half of 2021 has seen multiple funding rounds and deals that have shaped the fintech sphere, some of which would be highlighted in this review of major fintech deals that were sealed in the…

Three top competitors in the European luxury market—LVMH, Prada and Cartier—have united forces to leverage blockchain technology to combat the worsening challenge of counterfeiting. Counterfeiting remains one of the major challenges that luxury brands face. In the 2020 fiscal year alone, $1.3 billion worth of goods were seized by the US customs alone. To address this issue, these three brands have signed up to the Aura Blockchain Consortium, a non-profit that utilizes blockchain technology to tackle counterfeiting. The Aura Blockchain was launched earlier in 2019 by LVMH, in partnership with Microsoft and Consensys to achieve the same goal as the…

Image Credit: Forbes_CBDC The advancement of digital technology has transformed how payments and other financial services are conducted. Cash, which used to be king, is now giving way to digital forms of currencies. Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) are one of the digital alternatives to cash with a very promising potential for disrupting existing financial systems. CBDCs are blockchain-inspired virtual forms of a nation’s fiat currency. Although CBDCs are similar in design to cryptocurrencies, they are centralized, unlike cryptocurrencies, and are issued by the central bank of a nation.An interesting feature of a CBDC system is its capability to facilitate…

On Thursday, 8th of April, 2021, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) issued a warning to “unregistered” investment platforms, asking them to desist from offering Nigerians access to foreign securities. The Commission stated that only registered platforms can offer foreign securities to Nigerians. According to SEC’s published statement, “The Commission categorically states that by the provisions of Sections 67-70 of the Investments and Securities Act (ISA), 2007 and Rules 414 & 415 of the SEC Rules and Regulations, only foreign securities listed on any Exchange registered in Nigeria may be issued, sold or offered for sale or subscription to the…

Image Credit: Coinbase Recently, payment technology giant, Visa, announced that it would now support the settlement of transactions in USDC, a stablecoin that is powered by the ethereum blockchain. The new move by Visa was great news for the global crypto community. However, understanding what this means requires a fundamental understanding of what payment settlement is.Everytime you make a purchase using a Visa card, for example, a bundle of complex processes take place beneath the hood to ensure that the money moves from your bank account to the seller’s account. Without the money being transferred from your account to the…

The political system in Africa is still struggling to attain a full-fledged democracy. Elections are still being rigged, and freedom of expression is still significantly non-existent in a lot of African nations. The state of democracy in many African nations is still miles away from the true definition of democracy. One of the major challenges that affects democracy in Africa is the issue of electoral fraud. A democratic government is supposed to be one that is elected by the people, and not one where public office holders rig their way into political offices. Bitcoin, via blockchain technology, can be instrumental…

Image Credit: Forex trading seminar in Lagos by XM / XM.com As the level of unemployment in Nigeria grows at an alarming rate, Nigerian youths, more than previous times, are starting to explore multiple alternative paths to wealth creation. The quest to find sustainable means of earning good income without relying on the government or a formal job has earned forex trading and cryptocurrencies the widespread attention that they receive in Nigeria, especially among youths in the country. Forex trading and cryptocurrencies are two wealth-creation paths that have caught the attention of most Nigerian youths. A 2020 report by Dailyfx,…

A financial seismic shift is quietly but rapidly sweeping the coasts of Africa, with Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies championing the movement. The volume of crypto-related activities in Africa have continued to surge. Between May 2015 and December 2020, Nigeria traded a total of $566,668,692 worth of bitcoin on Paxful, making it the second largest bitcoin market on Paxful, globally. However, Nigeria is not the only African nation with a strong interest in cryptocurrencies. Other African nations such as Kenya, South Africa and Uganda experience similarly high engagements in the crypto space, coupled with investments of millions of dollars in crypto…

As the naira continues to struggle against the dollar and Nigeria’s economy continues to experience significant challenges, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is relentlessly trying to increase the inflow of diaspora remittances into the country, considering that it strengthens the economy and may influence the stabilization of the exchange rate of the naira. Just three months after the CBN announced that diaspora remittances would no longer be received in naira, the apex bank has now introduced a new “Naira 4 Dollar scheme.” In line with the new scheme, anyone who receives diaspora remittances through CBN-licensed IMTOs will be paid…