How premium price led sell of 1 Bitcoin for $85,000 in Nigeria

The cryptocurrency market has been moving at a fast speed, although several countries are either trying to catch up or to limit the usage of Bitcoin. Among the latter, the Central Bank of Nigeria [CBN] tried to ban the use of digital assets within the country.

On 22 February, when the value of Bitcoin plummeted briefly to $55k on the spot market, Nigeria saw a BTC premium of 49%. This high premium resulted in the value of Bitcoin hitting close to $85k on the Nigerian exchange. Meanwhile, at the time of publishing, other countries such as South Africa and Malaysia saw a premium of just 4 per cent and 4.01 per cent.

 

Interestingly, data show that Nigeria was one of the best-performing countries in terms of crypto operation in 2020. Bitcoin trading volumes in Africa have been among the fastest rising volumes in the world, with Nigeria leading the way. According to the study published by Blockchain.com, the country has seen a 60% rise in the use of its wallet service since April 2020.

Meanwhile, data from Google Trends have indicated that Nigeria has been leading the way in Bitcoin interest over the past 90 days.

Whereas other countries, such as Austria, Switzerland and Slovenia, were not far behind.

Given the continuing feud over the ban on bitcoin, the country’s crypto operations have been affected. Reports indicated that the deposit on the Naijacrypt exchange fell by 80 per cent on the day the ban was announced. The ban has resulted in many banks discouraging crypto transactions, and this has led to a hit on deposits.

However, this ban is still under review, and users in the country will look forwards and hope that the ban will be lifted, considering the popularity of cryptocurrencies in the country.

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