Visa, M-Pesa, and Onafriq have launched a pilot program in the Democratic Republic of the Congo that uses a U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin to settle cross-border mobile transactions. According to Odaily, the pilot covers use cases including cross-border top-ups for mobile wallets, international business transactions, and remittances.
The World Bank estimates that the average cost of cross-border remittances in sub-Saharan Africa is close to 8% of the transfer amount.
Visa previously partnered with African cryptocurrency exchange Yellow Card to explore stablecoin-based treasury management and international settlement.