Crypto exchange, OKX announces plans to exit Nigeria market.

Cryptocurrency exchange OKX has announced its plans to exit the Nigerian sector. According to an email sent to its Nigerian customers on Wednesday, it intends to discontinue services in the Nigerian market because of the country's unfavourable regulatory conditions.

Nigerian customers will be unable to open any new account on the platform from August 16 and customers are expected to withdraw their funds from OKX on or before the date.

“We are discontinuing OKX services in Nigeria after recent changes in local laws and regulations. This is based on our ongoing assessment of policies in each market we serve. From August 16, 2024, our customers will no longer be able to open any new positions or access any services on the platform, with the exception of withdrawals and closing/redemption of open positions. We request you to please review your account and complete applicable steps by 12:00 am (PST) on August 16, 2024.”

Earlier in May, OKX turned off the P2P feature for Nigerian users and removed the Naira from its platforms, in a statement on X at the time, it stated 

Due to a change in the local market requirements, trading in Naira would no longer be possible but trading P2P in other currencies would still be an available feature.

OKX users in the country have been requested to close open positions and orders on the P2P platform, cancel any spot orders in USDT, DAI, and EURT, and redeem and transfer their assets to their preferred wallets.

With this, OKX has become the second crypto platform to disable the P2P function for its Nigerian users, after Binance did so. Kucoin soon followed suit after that and recently announced intentions to start collecting a 7.5% VAT on transaction fees.

Binance has been in a prolonged legal battle with the Nigerian authorities, leading to the detainment of its exec and disabling its P2P trading feature. 

Although Richard Teng, Binance CEO claimed the exchange was working closely with the Nigerian government to resolve the situation, he later announced that the Nigerian authorities were demanding bribes to dismiss the money laundering trial against them.

Over the past several months, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has aimed to eliminate secrecy and unregulated transactions within the financial sector by implementing stricter regulations, including Know-Your-Customer guidelines. 

However, Nigerian authorities have taken a somewhat confusing stance on crypto regulations, they have consistently been clamping down on crypto exchanges and p2p trading platforms, in what they termed a crackdown on Naira manipulators.