Alright, ladies and gentlemen. So I would like to invite

Samukele Mkhize, country compliance

head of Binance Africa. Did I pronounce your name

correctly? Yes you did. So it's yeah. Samikele

Nkise. Samikele Nkise.

Beautiful. It's a beautiful South African name, right? Yeah.

Beautiful South African name. Yeah. Uh-uh. Really, really beautiful. I mean, I have

a a brother who is of course I'm Ghanaian. I've got a brother who has

a South African name and his name is Themba. I believe it means

hope in, in South African and you know he was named on the

back of Nelson Mandela being released so, you know, I I do show the South

African love, honestly. I have I'll tell you about

myself. I'm actually, so when we trace back our family lineage,

we're actually from the Congo, from the DRC. Yeah. Yeah. So, that's

where Mkise people actually from, where people I think, apparently, there's

a place in the Congo called Ambo, which is where we yeah. That's where we

descend from. That is beautiful. Wow. Wow. So you see

your whole surname has a whole lineage and history behind it.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Fantastic. Fantastic. Well, once

again, thank you Sam for coming in the show. So welcome to Fintech

Friday, a special edition in partnership with Binance Africa. So

today we're gonna talk about unlocking the power of Blockchain Technology across African

economies. So we're gonna touch upon opportunities and challenges for

regulating cryptocurrency, fostering innovation in the Fintech sector

across Africa, attracting investment and African

innovation hubs and then we're gonna touch on some use cases and some startups that

have come out on the back of all of this. So Sam,

apart from, you know, discussing names and, you know,

countries, you know, how you how you how you how have you been and what

have you been up to? Great. So, yeah. So I'm obviously at

Binance. I'm the Binance head of compliance for, for the Africa

region. It's it's been an amazing journey. I think we've obviously

been on a journey of, innovation, collaboration across the continent.

You know, really trying to get, or spread the, you know, just the

crypto story. You know, our story our story obviously dates back to 7

years now. It's actually great, where we literally, and probably

from your listeners, we had 15, you know, initial investment of about

15,000,000 USD, equivalent. And that's

where the crypto journey for for Binance kicks off. I think we're now sitting

at, just over 200,000,000 users globally, which is an

amazing, an amazing No problem. Over just 7 7 years.

Yeah. We've literally got access across the globe. And,

we obviously our preoccupation is now telling that good story

on the African continent and really spreading, you know you know,

driving, practical use cases. I think a lot of people have thought, like, when we

speak about crypto, it's something very, you know, very almost

abstract. But we are trying to to bring it home, make it, I think

we've got great connectivity across the continent and really show how it's breaking

borders, with respect to innovation, crypto investment, and

spreading the, your your the payments journey. Yeah.

Fantastic. I mean, it's quite a time that we're in right now, in terms of,

financial adoption, in terms of Africa, in terms of

cryptocurrency and the blockchain, and also smartphone

adoption. And there's just so many moving parts happening right now.

It's a very exciting time that we're in. Okay.

Yeah. Alright. Great. So, Sam, this thank you again for coming on on the show.

Let's let's go straight into talking about opportunities and challenges,

for regulating cryptocurrency on the continent. So I think, really and

truly, it's, I think it's a great time in terms of, the opportunities because right

now, you know, regulating cryptocurrency in Africa, there's a

significant opportunity, but there's also there's also a challenge at the same time. So,

you know, it's great for those that are unbanked and underbanked, you

know, being having access to cryptocurrency. I mean, the smartphone adoption in Africa

is fantastic, which is forming a platform for this to to take place as

well. And then also, you know, there's opportunities for jobs, you know,

for the tech and the finance to be created. You just mentioned how Binance has

grown, you know, over the past few years. And then there's remittance

as well, opportunities as well where, you know, it can it can it can form

as a it can form as a basis for maybe faster, more

secure remittance, etcetera. But at the same time, you know, there is

volatility in cryptocurrency and at the same time, you have things

such as you know money laundering that could be you know,

used in terms of cryptocurrency could be used as a vehicle for money laundering.

So as much as there's upsides there can be downsides as well. And

I just wanna hear from your perspective Sam, not just in

general, but also from Binance by Binance's perspective.

What are some of the opportunities and challenges that you see in terms of

regulating the crypto on the continent? Maybe just as a preface to

our discussion, you know, our philosophy as Binance has always been

to, collaborate, with, with governments and,

policymakers just with respect to crypto regulation. I think there's obviously always

the double edged sword. You know, it's almost the chicken and the egg where you

assess what comes first. Is it innovation or regulation? And,

really, regulators are faced with 3 key decisions. You

either you either ban it, as some jurisdictions have done. You,

you wait and learn to understand the market or, and then ultimately,

obviously, move towards regulation. And, I think what we've seen, especially on

the African continent, is that, there's definitely been that wait and learn

approach just to properly understand the market, properly understand its

impact. And, you know, that then obviously moves towards,

progressive regulation. And that's where I've come in, especially in our team. What

we've tried to do on the continent is really spread the word where we've taken

learnings from, different jurisdictions. So at the moment, we've actually got licenses

in 19 jurisdictions across the world. Wow. With

1 obviously also pending in, you know, in South Africa. And what we're trying to

do is, really engage regulators, show our best practices that we've,

you know, that we've done in, in in other jurisdictions. For instance, you've got

things like, onboarding standards, you know, for you made very good men

very important mention of the risks of, crypto assets. 1,

obviously, being market volatility. Mhmm. Others are then being,

especially, you know, from the financial intelligence and anti money laundering

perspective being, the various use cases of crypto and how they've

got a propensity of being used, for illicit activities.

Now what we've tried to do is really, you know, bring home,

certain learnings that we've got specifically with respect to our onboarding

structures, ensuring, you know, we've obviously got a principle against an

you know, anonymity. We don't do, business with clients we don't know.

We ensure that, you know, using the wallet addresses, it always goes back to a

warm body. We're able to conduct that vetting, up front with

respect to our know our client, you know, know your client, know your business

procedures. We've also got transaction monitoring procedures in place,

which ensure that, you know, as and when we see, onboard

already onboarded clients, we're able to appropriately monitor the

transactions, flag any suspicious transactions, and

just really ensuring that we create a very safe ecosystem. Because,

effectively, what we want in order to promote crypto adoption,

people need to know that, you know, their funds are safe with you. And that's

what we're really trying to do, just ensuring that we've got a safe ecosystem,

people able to trade, together. You know, still with that almost,

decentralized type feel, where you don't have, you know, a

strong regulatory, you know, banking type,

relationship. But at the same time, you know, we we we wanna ensure that we

don't want crypto assets ending up in, you know, funding, you know, conflict

regions or anything like that, or or any illicit activity. You know, we want

we still wanna ensure that it's legitimized, and that's why we've actually

really pushed for regulation. Just in ensuring that governments are really

able to conduct you know, play their role in, in the social

compact and ensuring that citizens are effect essentially safe. And then we obviously

then drive the innovation and, you know, create the platform for

citizens to to engage accordingly. Yeah. That's that's a very

powerful statement he made, Stems. I think, you know, as much as,

you know, Binance, you know, organisations such as Binance are just doing a

fantastic job in terms of, you know, encryption and making sure the platform

is safe and there's, you know, and there's, you know, regulations being observed. I think

it's also just as important for the for the government to be on board and

to collaborate with organisations such as yourself so that everyone

wins. So that everyone is able to play their part in making this

a safe and regulated, you know, society as far as

Fintech and, you know, crypto and blockchain goes. I mean, I I know using

the the Binance app. I mean, it's like when you're trying to log in, it's

like break trying to break into Fort Knox. I mean, there's like, you get the,

you know, the the the factor authentication, and then there's the

QR codes, and then there's the KYC as you mentioned. I mean, there there's so

many kind of steps you have to go through just to access the account. And,

you know, sometimes it may seem like quite a bit of friction, but it's really,

really important because of the the day and the age that we're in.

Absolutely. And especially, I think what you want is I just wanna give some, you

know, just some overall, you know, the stats speed, you know, we've, you know, we've

looked at. You're looking at, you know, when we look at West Africa, for example,

right, you've got a population in Ghana of about 34,450,000.

You'll correct me if I'm wrong. Mhmm. You know, mobile connections, for example, you you're

sitting at it's more than that. It's you 38,950,000. That's about a

130% of mobile connections, meaning you're dealing with a

very clued up populace who, you you know, have got the, the

ability to to connect Internet users. It's about 24,600,000.

That's about 69.8% of the population. So I

think, you know, you know, it's just, you know, the writing's on the wall, meaning

that the uptake is definitely there. The capacity to log on is

there. And you then have to ensure that, you know, you you

you you're providing a safe platform, a platform with the

appropriate, encryptions. You know, you've got your your pass

keys, multiple, multiple, you know, authenticated factor

authentication, which then ultimately really ensures that you've got the

ability, you know, you know, that we you know, we don't want a situation where

you you wake up and, you know, you you know, your funds are gone. That's

definitely not the type of ecosystem we wanna create. It's, it's all about

longevity, ensuring that people are able to invest in the market.

And then ultimately also leads to a lot of innovation as well. Because

once you've able to ensure that you you you get people who are able to

onboard, hold crypto, you know, we've also got a lot of other,

you know, great products from your spot product to your derivatives products.

You know, really, really, you know, really breaking down

borders, with respect to, peer to peer type trading.

And that's, you know, that's what we're ultimately trying to to, you know, trying to

achieve. Yeah. Absolutely. I believe, you know, Binance is doing some

great work in in terms of, like, fostering innovation in the Fintech space.

Like, I think what Binance is doing right now in Africa

with mobile money is is is is pretty fantastic. So now, you

know, there is now that integration with Binance and mobile

money where, you know, countries like Ghana and Uganda are able to kind of like

get into that technology. And I think it kind of, you know, closes that

gap between mobile money and the cryptocurrency because I think I had a

conversation with, you know, Yandi which is, you know, operations manager from

Binance Africa and she was just, you know, talking about how,

in terms of like mobile money, I think and spy and

cryptocurrency. You know, there's lots of similarities there.

And I already feel that, you know, mobile money could

transition on to just maybe purely, you know, crypto and Blockchain

and, you know, transactions or cross border

transactions can even be done a lot quicker and faster because of the, because of

the nature of the Blockchain. Yeah. And you you look. If

you look at some of the, you know, the, you know, practical use cases, you've

seen that people are leveraging towards the blockchain technology. 1, of course, is

that, and, you know, touching both on the commercial viability

and your, your regulatory environment. Transactions

on the blockchain technology are immutable. Right? Meaning that they can never be

deleted. They'll always be there. So there'll always be a a source of

funds and a trail of funds to ensure that, you know, you know how regulators

say they wanna follow the money. You've got the capability with that.

Right? And then really importantly, using the, you know, just

the speed of the blockchain technology, it really enhances your payments

capabilities. You know, it takes them to a new level. I think you're dealing

with transactions here literally cross border taking place, you know, within

seconds. And that's the ability of the very strong ability

of, you know, blockchain technology. What we've done at Binance is that we've

also in driving and fostering that innovation, we've obviously got

Binance Labs, which is our venture capital arm,

which looks at partnering, with Fintech startups and

creating various use cases using blockchain technology. So not merely

focused on our products, you know, but also driving, the

expansion, of the of the technology into other products and, you know, various

use cases. Because that's what we're all about. You know, we're all about spreading the

word and attempting to really onboard as, you know, you know, your most

you you know, your innovators and creating great, great solutions for our

clients. What you've then got also very importantly are the

incubation programs. Now we we take on, you know, you

know, you know, your smaller fintech entities, and attempt to really,

again, collaborate with them to create, you know, to create that, you know, those, you

know, those client centric solutions. And then but then most

importantly, I think the, you know, what we really drive is

education, consumer education, because there's no point in us speaking again, you

know, figuratively all of these great concepts. But if they if we don't bring

them home and, teach people, educate people on on the various use

cases of crypto from a very elementary onboarding

spot, level to your more complex, you know, you know,

your Coptics derivative type product, which is really great. People make a lot of money

from that. But, you know, there's no point if we don't teach people that. So

what we've done is that we've also got finance academy, which is

almost a, repository of, various learning systems.

You've got articles which we've published, contributed to,

you know, practical, almost learning case studies for people to properly understand how

it works. Because I think one of the biggest things we've observed across the continent

is that when if we wanna drive financial inclusion, we need to ensure that people

are at the right level of financial literacy. And, you know, and it's our

responsive social responsibility as entities such as finance to

ensuring that we, you know, we drive that type of education. So for people can

really have a a buy in and, are able to trade,

you know, legitimately and, you know, we we have and, you

know, more, with the from an appropriately type of informed, way. And

that's it. Yeah. No. That's very, very, very important. I think

everyone have an access to education. So, you know,

helping, you know, to close that financial inclusion gap is really, really

key. I think, you know, we can have all of the technology, the blockchain, the

currency there, but if people don't actually know how to use it and actually how

to maximize it and all the different use cases, we're not

really gonna be able to drive Africa for the way in which we can grow

it forward. And I think it's more than just, and I'm glad you highlighted it

because it's just more than just being able to, you know, make

transactions and allowing the average African

citizen to be, you know, to be banked or or or or a

bit or have better access to financial resources. But it's

also being able to leverage these opportunities to kind of bring Africa out of

poverty and to, you know, push Africa forward. I think it's really, really

important. And I'm really excited about Binance Labs and what Binance is

doing partnering with some of these startups. I mean, you could there's so

many startups out there that are leveraging blockchain technology really well like

Bitlands, which uses it for, you know, land transactions and then you've

got Agri Ledger, you know, which uses it for global food systems and then you

have Twiga, which is which is using it for groceries. So,

I think that I think it's just clear that the opportunities are limitless

and, you know, I I think it's really important as well that there are incubators

and there's accelerators and there's education institutions such as yours

to help push people forward and to help, you know, startups and

entrepreneurs and innovators to, you know, really maximise

the Blockchain technology. I mean, it's fantastic what Mess Ghana is doing.

IHarp in Kenya is doing and BongoHive in Zambia is doing as well.

In terms of Binance, I've got a question in terms of Binance Africa.

Do you guys because it's you guys are always adding features to the platform. I

think the product roadmap is just fantastic. Does Binance

Africa, have plans to perhaps maybe integrate

maybe some of the best features or some of the best products that

that startups that are produced on the back of Binance Africa's funding

to integrate some of the best features or products that they make into the platform.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Absolutely. Because ultimately, it's it's all

about, you know, essentially collaboration. Right? We take learnings from,

very, you know, commercially viable type products. I think, a similar,

initiative, for example, has been, in, you know, in South Africa, we've got,

you know, partnerships with, in, you know, huge retailers such as Pick N Pay.

And, you know, that again, that was it's a strict collaboration with Binance and

other, you know, other, you know, other payment service provider type entities,

providing the a providing the technology to enable that seamless

transaction, where you literally can work it for the morning and you buy a loaf

of bread using your crypto. And that's the type of, you know, these are the

solutions that we're definitely looking for, where you where you take these solutions,

you can really, you know, add them or, you know, to the blockchain

type technology, and you're able to utilize them very practically. And it speaks

to the practical use cases. And, you know, these are the solutions again. You know,

you know, as you've noted, there's so many innovations across the continent. You

know, we definitely not, I don't think we are,

ignorant to the, you know, to the, use cases of blockchain

technology as Africans. And in addition, it really has

got the potential to, break down the barriers. You know, we always talk

about, you know, this Africa free trade zone and how we wanna almost create of

almost you know, we wanna leverage off the population and Yeah. You know, use cases.

And I think this is a great opportunity to do so because as soon as

you streamline, in payments, and investments, what

you're doing is you are ultimately creating almost a a borderless type of financial

ecosystem. And once you can achieve that, and you're looking at trade between,

you know, I always say, you know, you get trade between Accra, Johannesburg,

Harare, Lusaka. That's that's really the dream. Right? And that's what we wanna

work towards. And I think, you know, especially when we talk

tech, we've always got the, the ability to get

caught up in the technical jargon, forgetting about the practical use case that we

wanna use it for. And that's what we think we wanna do. So as Binance,

that's really the day you know, that's really the journey. It's to, you know, create

this type of, you know, partner with, you know, key role players

across the fintech industry, ensure that you've got a safe,

safe, transparent type ecosystem. You know, you ensure

that you also collaborate with regulators. You know, for example, we've got so

many we we've obtained so many regulatory requests from various

regulators. We've we've partnered over the years, even with

law enforcement. We've we've, one conducted trainings, on

blockchain technology with law enforcement agencies. And then secondly, we've

acted as a very, important source of information, at times,

even averting kidnappings, where we're able to, you know, assist you know, you

know, really collaborate with authorities in in getting, you know, just in ensuring

that they can find the perpetrators. Because, you know, what you're finding is that, because

of the nature of blockchain technology, are thinking, you know, this is probably a way

out. Whereas oblivious of the fact that the blockchain technology is the technology

which which we effectively have control over. We understand how it works, and we can

track we can track it down. And that's what we've only you know, we've we've

given that information to law enforcement. They've been able to utilize it in the

investigation. So I think it's it's it's a really we've really got a good story

to tell. And, you know, we just really need to expand that

web and work together with regulators, forming those policies

that they need. We get those minimum requirements right, and then we and then we

and then we fast innovation. I think it's fantastic. It's a beautiful

time to be in right now, Sam. I think, when you look at different African

countries, they all have their different they all have their own kind of, like, mobile

money platforms where there's MTN money and Pesa, etcetera. Vodafone and

Cash, whatever will now it's Teleso and Ghana at least. But

if that was all eradicated and it was just maybe blockchain or maybe they all

were using BNB or maybe they were using stable coins to to, you

know, to transact or buy and sell. It would just be so

much smoother and quicker and more universal. So I think

the key point that you mentioned here is collaboration, collaboration, collaboration.

And I'm glad this has been done on the governmental level as well.

I mean, I think you've probably seen where Ghana wants to be, you know, the

number one, you know, blockchain back to government. You know, I think

99% of the government is run on on the digital platform,

ghana.gov. So I think we're starting to see so so how how far

this this is a question I've got for you. How far do you think are

we from having this, what I would say

is this, this nirvana of,

you know, like financial, you know, everything, everyone's in the same financial

platform. Everyone's on the same page in terms of the government,

finance, you know, education. Almost everyone had been

educated. How how many years do you think do you think we are from seeing

all this come together to to make, you know, the blockchain

technology, you know, to see really the full potential of the

blockchain technology in Africa? Look. I think it's it's it's

very difficult to say given that, I think especially even in Africa, the

countries aren't necessarily we're not all all on the same level with respect to both

up. For example, Ghana. So, you know, you're probably a front runner. But,

but, you know, I would say, obviously, you know, over the next decade, you know,

just 10 years, that long which is not a long time. It's a long time.

You know, you know, we've really got the capabilities of

almost standardizing it, you know, across the region. And and you're quite right. You know?

So you get a government which is almost I think South Africa as well, where

where you there's definitely, attempts to make it, you know, more digitized.

But, I think definitely not on the level of blockchain technology at this

point in time. But, Yeah. For me, I think we're definitely seeing a

more collaborative wave of of, of of policymakers, and

they wanna see this work. So, you know, if you, you know, look. It's it's,

you know, how long is a piece of string? And I'd say, you know, maybe

next week, 15 years. I would love to see it. I definitely

see a willingness in, you know, you you I mean, I I you know, I

haven't already seen a a particularly hostile type,

you know, approach towards it on the continent. I think there's definitely a willingness. The

key thing is the learning, and if we if we get the educational part

right, we're definitely, on a good journey.

Absolutely. I think the building blocks are there for sure. For example, I think by

2030, I think 88% of the Ghanaian, population

will have smartphone adoption, which is phenomenal. Absolutely

phenomenal. So I think when everyone has smartphones, when everyone has access

to education, and more and more people are on, you know,

are banked. And, you know, and the government is more kind

of, based on the blockchain. I think this is when we're really gonna see all

of this kind of come together really nicely and be very, very powerful

for the whole continent to see.

Just before we wrap up, just wanted to ask, do you have any final points

or any final words that you wanna make in terms of unlocking the power of

blockchain technology across African economies?

Look. For me, our motto as as our motto suggests, you know, freedom of

money. And we, you know, we really wanna get as many people as we

can onto the platform. We've got very, I don't wanna say

we have low barriers to entry, but we've got fair barriers to entry. You know?

I show you, you know, you you know, if you've got your documentation in place,

we're able to appropriately identify you. We're able to give you access to our

platform. And I think as we've seen across the continent, I think we've,

we've got a heavily a huge unbanked population. And, we

we definitely see, blockchain and crypto assets as

a as a way around that. Going forward, we, you know, we see, you

know, your your wallet or payments type,

financial services, growing exponentially, probably far exceeding

banking services over the past next next decade or 2,

and we wanna be at the helm of that. And how do I how we

wanna do that is by ensuring that we integrate all of these initiatives onto the

blockchain technology and really drive innovation and growth there.

That's a very good point actually in regards to digital wallets exceeding,

you know, traditional banks. I think, you know, that industry is certainly

being disrupted, the banking industry for sure. And you've seen, you know,

platforms like Revolut really emerge and really

challenge, you know, the the traditional banks. And, you know, of course, platforms like

Binance as well really challenge, you know, the the Fintech and, you know,

and banking industry for sure. Sam, these are some fantastic words

that you've shared. Thank you for sharing some insights and wisdom with the audience.

Just as we, sign out, where can anyone connect with

yourself and keep up with what Binance is doing?

Yeah. So, look, look, you can actually find, you know, Binance on, you know,

Binance web page. There's a lot of information on, Binance there,

the different products we've got. Have a look at the Binance Academy. Learn about,

Binance. Educate yourself. In addition, me personally, you know, I'm on

LinkedIn. I'm I'm always sharing, you know, your foremost,

you know, crypto regulations, the work we're doing there, the work

I'm doing collaborating with, you know, regulators across the continent,

any, you know, media work as well, which is very important. So, yeah, I think

there's there's great opportunity to connect. And thank you so much for having me, and

thank you for, thank you to your listeners. Likewise. Thank you so much, Sam, for

for coming on. So that's it, everyone. That's Sam

Mhkize? Right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's

the one. Sam Mhkize, country compliance head of Binance

Africa. And, we'll catch you on the next episode. Thank

you so much for listening.