Flutterwave founder and chief executive Olugbenga “GB” Agboola said stablecoins are poised to materially upgrade Africa’s cross-border payments, arguing that the biggest winners will be firms that already combine local reach with deep compliance capabilities to convert digital assets into day-to-day utility.
Stablecoins as a settlement layer, not a standalone product
Agboola made the remarks during two appearances at Money 20/20 Europe in Amsterdam, including a fireside conversation with Dima Kats, founder and group executive chair of Clear Junction, titled “Building the Rails: Stablecoin Architecture from Lagos to London.” The discussion took place under the Money Stack Rewired: Stablecoins and Beyond theme.
In direct terms about Flutterwave’s role, he said stablecoins should not be viewed as a separate product line. Instead, they function as a quicker settlement layer that sits on top of the company’s established payout infrastructure across local and international corridors.
For corporate treasurers operating across multiple African markets, Agboola positioned stablecoins as a practical instrument for liquidity and foreign-exchange management—especially when conventional banking channels are unavailable. “Stablecoin is completely different because money moves at the speed of the internet, not at the speed of banks closing up their house. If you pay with stablecoin, you get that money instantly,” he said.
Why compliance and payouts still matter
Asked whether stablecoins could render payments intermediaries unnecessary, Agboola drew a distinction between the ease of moving value and the difficulty of making it legally usable. He said transferring tokens from wallet to wallet is straightforward, but the harder issues—legal requirements, anti-money-laundering rules, and the final step of distributing funds into local bank accounts across different jurisdictions—are precisely what keep companies like Flutterwave relevant.
Agboola also emphasized the importance of building infrastructure that can withstand stress from the start. “I’ve been in payments for about 20 years now, and the infrastructure that manages customer funds must be designed for shocks from day one; it doesn’t matter if the value comes from stablecoin or fiat. This is what we’ve prioritised, giving customers one wallet address that is chain-agnostic, supported by all the biggest blockchains, ensuring customer funds are not at risk,” he said.
Looking ahead from Flutterwave’s 10th anniversary
Agboola discussed the company’s next phase during a live appearance on Fintech.TV’s Market Movers, broadcast from the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) broadcast center. He used Flutterwave’s 10th anniversary as a starting point for a broader look at where the company plans to go over the coming decade.
He described Flutterwave’s progression, saying the prior ten years were focused on linking Africa’s fragmented payments landscape through a single application programming interface. The next stage, he said, will center on turning Flutterwave into a “financial operating system” for the continent.
As part of that shift, Agboola pointed to Flutterwave’s recently secured microfinance banking license in Nigeria, describing it as a structural step away from being merely a “money in transit” provider and toward becoming an infrastructure foundation. He said deeper integration can reduce friction across the value chain, raise network reliability, and create new business verticals throughout the broader ecosystem.
This direction, he added, lines up with Flutterwave’s objective of constructing a multi-rail setup in which stablecoin and fiat routes operate together to support Africa’s growth.
Partnerships underpinning regulated stablecoin infrastructure
To reinforce the cross-border capabilities of its planned financial operating system, Flutterwave continues expanding a network of global digital-asset partnerships, including Circle, Polygon, Fireblocks Flow, Nuvion, and Tempo. Agboola said this collaborative web is intended to serve as the backbone of what the company is positioning as Africa’s largest regulated stablecoin infrastructure.
