the important thing to note

dont use exchanges as stores of value(like a bank account) treat them as just a gateway between fiat(government currency) and cryptocurrency.
where you then put your cryptocurrency into a wallet where you control the keys

treating a exchange as a bank, might seem as an easy thing, but it just ends up being a system of following their policies, much like following government rules. where they can lock your accounts and give you headaches trying to withdraw your value if you breach their rules.

so treat exchanges as gateways. not bank accounts

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that said
without good easy access methods to swap fiat with cryptocurrency. yes adoption of cryptocurrency would not be growing as quickly

that said when i last visited africa. i did see a few 'kiosk's of people swapping currencies hand to hand. which is a more popular and common sight to see in africa compared to the banking systems of UK/US

i can see the use of kiosks growing and many setting up their own kiosks.
whereby those without bank accounts dont need a bank account to then use an exchange to then get cryptocurrency to then move to your own wallet

instead those without a bank account hand over paper cash to the kiosk and the kiosk puts cryptocurrency on that persons wallet.
where its the kiosk operate that uses his/her(kiosk owner) bank account to refill their own cryptocurrency reserves that they then tender to their kiosk customers

You can trade in person but it is very risky. I don't trade personally like that. When you meet a person in real life, for crypto trading, a lot of risk.

There are platforms for peer-to-peer tradings, with Escrow for safety of both trader sides.

Payment methods are very diversify and with peer to peer trading platforms, you don't have to worry that banks will know you are doing cryptocurrency tradings.

Banks can not arbitrarily block your bank account or just based on a request from one side, likely your trade partner, a scammer want to attack you personally.

meeting a complete stranger and handing them a suitcase of cash is a big no no.  no one should ever do such
but i have seen merchant kiosks, i have seen established 'meetups' where regular people meet and get to know each other and all trades are done in the venue(coffee shop/bar) where the trades are witnessed by a few people. much like playing poker with a group of people where everyone ends up trusting each other because they know they cant get away with cheating another person with other people there.

and as for the kiosks they are more professional. not a pop-up- shop that disappears the next day, but a service location thats there all year round and would earn a bad reputation if it cheated customers

so its a case of using common sense and caution when it comes to hand-to-hand swaps


the issue with these platforms both peer to peer and central exchanges. is the banking ability to freeze money. or for some to perform "chargeback" scams
where they deposit money. wait for the timedelays release of coin. take the coin out.
and then phone their bank and pretend their account got hacked and ask for a refurn of funds.
this alone has caused the most havoc for peer-to-peer trading platforms (localbitcoins years ago had alots of reports of this) where by those selling coin lost out alot even with a escrow

the other thing to note is that when lots of chargeback scammers used to do this with central exchanges. all these 'we been hacked' customers ended up having banks up the exchanges on a red flag risk for in banks minds having the the central exchanges receiving stolen funds enmasse
and this became in the early days the main reasons accounts where being shut down for associating with exchanges.

exchanges ofcourse then legitimised themselves to prove it was not their fault and implemented strict KYC to prove the customer doing the money transfer was the account owner so that the banks were not as easy to beleive scammers lies.
whihc is why central exchanges have now been able to survive and operate better with banks

but for people without a bank account in africa. the easier option is to find these trusted kiosks/meetups and not just find some random stranger they hve never seen nor will ever see again.


you buying bitcoin easy..
but for those selling bitcoin.. well.. its not as you think

receiving lots of small amounts from lots of people.. does raise a red flag with your banks. especially if your using a personal bank account. yet transacting as of you are a business.
you wil find many bitcoin sellers on defi/p2p platforms who get lots of fiat randomly . end up having to register as a business and hen register as a money service business to then do KYC.. or simply ask for KYC before doing any business/regulatory registration simply so they can prove to their bank that the funds are from genuine account holders sending funds and not hackers.

but.. in bitcoin buyers eyes they dont care about what bitcoin sellers have to do or end up having headaches over later on. as long as the buyer can buy some coin from one guy.. and never care again. and just find someone else to buy from if the first guy has issues, disappears. .. basically a 'doesnt affect me so not my concern' selfish attitude

which for now works fine for defi/p2p. but just like how localbitcoins slowly degraded.. so wil defi-p2p. for the exact same reasons

where is the oink to ascertain this fact or assumption? remember anyone can just come up with anything from anywhere with a baseless fact.


i think we all know about this, anything more latest than this which is common with African countries.


Accept this ad it is not meant for an attack but rather the fact, Nigeria is not the only country with such encounter, not even the African countries alone but everywhere all over the world has such challenges with government, people make use of exchanges to trade and overcome some of this embargoes using p2p.


i see nothing new here as well aside the common ABCD we all know about El-Savador.

You are correct, Nigerian youths have discovered Crypto as a source of income because the government of Nigeria has found it difficult to provide job opportunities for all youths, including university graduates, so learning about Bitcoin has brought an end to their suffering, as they can trade Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies to gain profit.

The discovery of bitcoin, and cryptocurrencies in general in Nigeria, by the youths, as another source through which good living can be earned, have indeed reduced the crime rate in the streets, of the cities in Nigeria.
I don't know very much about Central African Republic aside the fact that it is the second country to approve bitcoin as a legal tender.

In terms of bitcoin payment gateway, as well as exchanges, I think franky1 has indeed pointed out some really important things to note, exchanges, most especially the centralized ones, like Binance and the rest, are also governments of their own, they pay tribute to the same government we all are trying to break free from, so it is important to apply caution to how we see and use such exchanges, no doubt, they have all contributed greatly, to the adoption of Bitcoin in almost every city of the world, but they are not the Last hope for bitcoin adoption, they are only but a stepping stone to what is to come in the future.

I quite agree with you that exchanges aren't all that perfect since themselves looks centralized and the sole aim of bitcoin is decentralisation. But currently it's the best way to exchange your coins to fiat, because the issue of P2P is very risky. To embark on it one has to fully trust the other partner or better still look for an escrow. Sometimes these escrows team up with the other partner to scam people of either there coin or fiat. I have being a victim of such circumstances. So currently the I only do give advice of Binance and its like to people. But if at all there are better P2P with trusted escrows I would love your suggestions on them

Indeed Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies adoption in Nigeria have helped to reduce the burden of unemployment on the government and also helped the teaming youths in Nigeria to be gainfully engaged by being able to fend for themselves. The high rate of inflation and corruption in Nigeria has pushed many youths who don't have self-control into crimes but the discovery of trading and other cryptocurrency activities has helped to reduce the crime rate and exchanges have helped many to learn from easy tools made available on the exchanges. In Nigeria for instance the most popular exchange is Binance and this exchange has helped a lot of newbie traders build their skills.

In relation to P2P trading, there are many good exchanges where you can trade P2P even if your crypto is not stored in the exchange which shouldn't be anyway. You can simply send whatever you intend to trade to the exchange and complete your transaction and for those falling for all that social medial investment, that is their fault. It can't be reiterated more, all those ads of pay X amount and get XX amount have always been scams and that is greediness on their part and has nothing to do with crypto.