Nigerian fintech Kredete has bought a South African company that already holds a Crypto Asset Service Provider (CASP) licence from the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA), giving it a regulated way to offer stablecoin-powered remittances and payments to individuals and businesses in South Africa. Kredete says the deal was an all-share acquisition, completed through a subsidiary focused on stablecoin infrastructure. It has not named the company it bought and has not disclosed a price or valuation, so the size of the deal is unknown. Tobi Adebowale, Kredete’s Head of Legal, said the move reflects the company’s belief in stablecoins as the future of finance in Africa and its commitment to “secure and compliant financial infrastructure” for the diaspora communities and businesses it serves.
Buying a licence rather than applying for one is a shortcut worth understanding. The FSCA’s regime for crypto asset service providers has been in force since June 2023. By mid-December 2025 the regulator had received 512 applications, approved 300, declined 14 and seen 121 withdrawn, mostly after it raised concerns about the applicants’ business models, according to figures reported by IOL and DLA Piper. The declines were largely over “fit and proper” requirements under the Financial Advisory and Intermediary Services (FAIS) Act, including weak operational ability and limited crypto experience. The FSCA also had 81 investigations open into suspected unlicensed operators, 56 of them still running. Against that backdrop, taking over an entity that has already cleared the process can save a foreign firm time. This newsroom could not find out whether the FSCA has to approve the change of ownership or whether it has signed off, and Kredete has not said, so that remains an open question.
The deal sits on top of a busy few weeks for the company. Founded in 2022 by Adeola Adedewe, Kredete raised a $22 million Series A in September 2025, led by AfricInvest with Partech and Polymorphic Capital, which took its total funding to $24.75 million. It started by helping African immigrants in the United States build credit while sending money home, and it has since pushed into stablecoin settlement, with plans announced at the time for Canada, the United Kingdom and Europe. On September 21 this year it also announced the acquisition of Gravv, an infrastructure platform that connects banks, blockchain networks and local payment rails, a separate deal whose terms were likewise not disclosed. In coverage of that deal Kredete cites more than 6.5 million users and $18 billion in annualised payments volume, and credits Gravv with over $3 billion in annualised volume. Those figures are the companies’ own. They also sit awkwardly beside the 700,000 monthly users cited at the Series A, which is a different measure, so treat the user numbers with care. Kredete says it now supports payments to more than 60 countries, and its approvals already include virtual asset and payment service provider authorisations in Argentina and an International Money Transfer Operator licence in Ghana.
The harder question is the regulation that is still moving. South Africa’s finance minister said in the February 2026 Budget Speech that draft rules would bring crypto assets into the country’s exchange control regime. Law firm Baker McKenzie noted in March that, once the rules change, cross-border crypto transfers could need prior approval from the South African Reserve Bank, and that payment models built on stablecoins may have to be redesigned. At the moment a High Court ruling in the Standard Bank v SARB case held that crypto assets are not “capital” under the current regulation, so transfers abroad do not need central bank approval, but the Reserve Bank has been granted leave to appeal. As of an April update from law firm Werksmans, no draft had been published, and it is unclear whether stablecoins will be covered. This newsroom has not confirmed whether that has changed since. For a company whose product is moving stablecoins across borders, that is the rule to watch, not the licence alone.
For South African users, the practical question is price and speed against the banks and money transfer operators they use today. Kredete says it will be faster and cheaper but has published no South African pricing, corridors or launch date. For the wider market, the deal is a signal of how stablecoin payment companies are expanding: market by market, and by buying a regulated base rather than waiting in the queue.
