The Central Bank of Nigeria has imposed an N800m fine on three Deposit Money Banks in the country for violating regulations barring customers from transacting in cryptocurrencies. According to a Bloomberg report released on Wednesday, the three banks are Access Bank Plc, Stanbic IBTC, and the United Bank for Africa Plc.
The report noted that the penalties were part of efforts by the apex bank to ensure that banks implement an order to block trading in cryptocurrencies due to the threat they pose to Nigeria’s financial system.
The directive was contained in a circular issued by the CBN in February 2021. In addition, the CBN had in November directed banks to close the accounts of two individuals and a company for allegedly trading in cryptocurrencies.
Despite these regulations, Nigeria accounts for the largest volume of cryptocurrency transactions outside the United States., according to Paxful, a Bitcoin marketplace. The country also has the largest proportion of retail users conducting crypto transactions under $10,000, Chainalysis says.
The banks include Stanbic IBTC Bank, Access Bank, United Bank for Africa and Fidelity Bank. Stanbic Bank, according to the report was fined N200 million for two accounts alleged to have been used for crypto accounts.
Access Bank was fined N500 million for failure to close customers’ crypto accounts; UBA was fined N100 million and Fidelity Bank was fined N14.3 million. Stanbic IBTC told Bloomberg that it had followed the CBN directive but that some transactions may have passed through its system undetected. Nigeria, according to Paxful, a Bitcoin marketplace, accounts for the largest volume of cryptocurrency transactions outside the U.S.
