
CBN Opens Second Regulatory Sandbox With Dedicated Crypto Track
Nigeria's Central Bank has opened a second regulatory sandbox featuring a dedicated track for cryptocurrency firms, a concrete regulatory signal for digital-finance operators across the continent. The dedicated crypto lane marks a structural shift in how Africa's largest central bank is engaging with virtual asset businesses.
CBN Sandbox: testing is not the same as welcoming
A dedicated crypto track inside Nigeria's central bank sandbox sounds like a breakthrough — and after years of outright hostility toward virtual assets, it genuinely is a shift.
But read the small print: sandbox participation is explicitly not a licence. Firms test inside 'clearly defined parameters' set by the CBN, and when the window closes, they're back where they started unless the bank decides to build a permanent framework around what it learned.
With tax obligations already landing on exchanges and a unification order whose boundaries are still undefined, the real question is whether the sandbox produces rules — or just buys the regulator more time to watch.
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- CBN opens second regulatory sandbox with dedicated track for crypto firms · nairametrics.com · T2