M-Pesa Has Stood in Crypto’s Way

Many think it is easier for Kenyans to embrace crypto because of M-Pesa. But, unfortunately, it turns out to be the other way.When it comes to the adoption of crypto, Kenya is a unique market in Africa and the rest of the world. At the center of that is the overwhelming need in the country to interface with M-Pesa.The mobile money service facilitates the bulk of transactions in almost every sector of the Kenyan economy. According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS), the government agency that collects, analyses, and disseminates data, over 90% of the adult population in the country has an M-Pesa e-wallet.At face value, this exposure of the population to mobile banking might seem like the ideal environment for cryptocurrencies. Indeed, it is the case, but unfortunately, that is balanced out with another force.M-Pesa could have been a great ally of crypto if those running it did not see it as a competitor, and therefore shouldn’t be enabled to grow. It is M-Pesa, and not the regulator, that killed the first two native Bitcoin exchanges on the African continent.In 2013, Pelle Braendgaard, a Danish computer programmer, moved to Kenya with a huge dream to interface two fintech technologies that mesmerized him at the time; M-Pesa and Bitcoin. Working with others he met in Nairobi, they launched Kipochi, a wallet, and exchange that could make converting between Bitcoin and M-Pesa fast, secure and convenient.However, within a year, they had to close down Kipochi after Safaricom, the telco company behind M-Pesa, pushed their payment processor, KopoKopo, to cease the service. While the regulator had given Kipochi a tentative go-ahead, it could not operate anymore without access to the M-Pesa platform.Pelle Braendgaard, in the recent interview with BitKe, has claimed that the order to deny them access to M-Pesa…