Paxful, a global peer-to-peer fintech, has said Nigeria is now its biggest market with a volume of $1.5bn.

It disclosed this on Tuesday in a statement, titled ‘Nigeria emerges as Paxful’s biggest market, hits $1.5bn in volume with over 1.5 million users’.

The Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of Paxful, Ray Youssef, said, “Our mission at Paxful is to give everyone equal access to finance no matter who they are or where they are so they can control their own money and build the future they want with financial freedom.

“The financial system is failing 99 per cent of the world’s population; it is disconnected and out of date. This means there is no way out of income inequality for a lot of people in the world. With cryptocurrencies, we see an alternative: a way to rest the financial system based on equality.”

He added, “We are on track for a 20 per cent+ increase in volume this year. We are seeing growth in all our markets and especially among groups or in countries where there’s a real need for cryptocurrencies: where the traditional financial system is failing people, whether that is because of extreme volatility, strict capital controls or high transaction costs.

“People are looking for freedom from these constraints and find that in cryptocurrencies. So, there is a real increase in people using cryptocurrencies for their original purpose – as currencies and not just as a speculative asset.”

Paxful announced that over $5bn had been traded to date on its platform globally, with over six million users.

It said as of April 2021, the top four countries by volume on Paxful aside from Nigeria were China, United States, India, and Kenya.