Barely a week after the Nigerian government demanded $10 billion in retribution from Binance, the major global cryptocurrency player, it has announced the full discontinuation of all services in the local fiat currency, the Nigerian naira (NGN).
The platform made this known in a statement on Tuesday, disclosing that users with any remaining NGN balances will be automatically converted to Tether (USDT) stablecoin after March 8.
Users are advised to withdraw, trade their NGN assets, or convert them into cryptocurrency before this deadline.
In addition, trading pairs involving NGN and the ability to deposit using NGN will cease temporarily. Moreover, NGN will no longer be a supported payment method across Binance’s range of services.
“Please note that the conversion rate is calculated based on the average closing price of the USDT/NGN trading pair on Binance Spot in the last seven days,” the announcement reads.
Binance will also immediately suspend NGN deposits, as such transactions will not be supported after 2:00 p.m. UTC on March 5.
Binance also mentioned that Binance’s peer-to-peer platform delisted all NGN trading pairs in late February.
The news on the complete removal of the Nigerian naira from Binance comes amid the company facing significant regulatory scrutiny in Nigeria.
Persecondnews recalls that the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Dr. Olayemi Cardoso, disclosed that more than $26 billion was channeled through a cryptocurrency platform, Binance, in the last year.
Cardoso disclosed this at a press briefing after the 293rd meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee in Abuja.
The Binance exchange is a leading cryptocurrency exchange founded in 2017.
It features a strong focus on altcoin trading.
Binance offers crypto-to-crypto trading in more than 350 cryptocurrencies and virtual tokens, including bitcoin, ether, litecoin, dogecoin, and its own coin, BNB.
While answering questions from journalists on the recent restriction on Binance and other cryptocurrency platforms, the CBN boss said:”In the last one year, more than $26 billion has been funneled through Binance without trace.”
He added that the CBN is moving to a very aggressive regulatory environment.
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