Nigerians should really think twice about supporting Binance. It really bothers me that some people ignored my warnings – Michael Nwafor

Nigerians should really think twice about supporting Binance. It really bothers me that some people ignored my warnings – Michael Nwafor

Today, the government has blocked Binance P2P for allowing economic exploitation on its platform.

I am a Crypto founder. I believe in Crypto.
Despite being a believer in Crypto, I also know that centralised exchanges do not represent the core principles of the Crypto economy. Moreso, this is not the time to play Crypto politics but it’s a time to put National Interest above individual interests to save the Naira.

Binance wouldn’t allow what’s happening on their Nigerian P2P platform elsewhere in the world.

I am very proud of the Nigerian government for swiftly blocking their website.

But unfortunately, that block is ineffective right now. Crypto is borderless. VPN is king.

But I will give out a free expert advice to those in government on this VPN access issue:

First, instruct Internet Service Providers to block VPN access to the restricted websites using Deep Packet Inspection – DPI techniques.

Secondly, reach out to the VPN Trust Initiative – a trade association of VPN providers across the world. Most Nigerians use ExpressVPN, NordVPN or Surfshark etc, and these VPN providers are members of the VPN Trust Initiative. Gemsbok VPN, a product of my company, has close working relationship with the VTI. This is the organisation that can help the Nigerian government in ensuring that nobody will use VPN to bypass the blocked exchanges until the exchanges commit to placing a limit to how much users can trade the Naira on their platform.

My name is Charles Awuzie and I love Crypto just as I love Nigeria but if put side by side, I’ll support national interest over my Crypto interest.

Binance and co should support us in the fight to save Nigeria and not create an enabling environment for the death of Naira.

Brilliant . That’s what they do.

That’s why I said the solution is in telling Binance Nigeria Ltd or any other licenced Crypto trading platform to fix their trading platforms such that:

1. you can only take one position on a currency. e. g. sell order of say volume $5m @ N1,700 with base per tranx value of N1bn. Fine, no Wahala. But same dealer cannot simultaneously open and place another sell order on say $5m @ N1,700 with base per tranx value of N5m sell to the real and most likely buyers.

2. A proper and regulated trading platform closes a deal via an auto-matching of offer and sell. You don’t get to even start deciding whether you will honor the deal or not. The system helps you😉. So if you advertise wrongly or mischievously and want to duck the deal then you are fucked. The system closes the deal for you without your input and you are bound to deliver. Systems even do the delivery for you to accounts. You fail to honor the deal then the system shuts you down and blacklists you and your details circulated to other trading platforms that you are a settlement risk so no one takes you onboard. When these false offers are hit once or twice then they will think twice about spoofing.

Binance has a history of mischief in France, Malaysia ,Malta, and some other countries I can’t remember now. Even the US has an unsettled lawsuit or investigation on them. Once the US slams them, they may get a global ban but do we have that time? There are more honorable crypto platforms.

I hear the banks are even using them to trade their FX. How successful will it be to shut them down? No idea. These dudes are under g. Policing virtual trades and assets is not easy but doable.

Now, here’s the puzzle? There is an empirically established relationship between cryptos and FX rates… as the $/€/Â¥/£ are all intermediate or broker currencies to switch. Cryptos recently took a dive but is coming up but appears to be faster than global average in Naija due to the poor fundamentals of our economy and Naira. With cryptos picking up in values, some Naija dudes are using it to hedge and to complete the deal must first purchase $ or £ etc. same for the reverse trade. This makes fx demand also overwhelming

Tell BAT to shut down Binance and fix the simultaneous opening of trading windows with different offers or positions for Naira. And regulate it that any settlement risk trader is thrown out…preferably under the bus🙂. That should stop spoofing.

Odiegwu indeed