In December 2023, Keji Pius was stranded in Lusaka, Zambia, with a crypto wallet full of USDT—a digital currency pegged to the US Dollar—and no way to spend it.
Pius, a Nigerian founder who earns in both Naira and stablecoins, said she ran out of the Zambian Kwacha she exchanged at the airport.
“I had a problem spending USDT because I couldn’t simply walk into a store, buy something, and pay with my stablecoin,” she recalled.
Left with no choice, Pius had to convert her USDT into a currency that Zambian merchants would accept. She opened an app on her phone, combed through peer-to-peer (P2P) cryptocurrency exchange apps, searching for a buyer willing to trade fiat for stablecoins.
She converted the stablecoins into Naira before finding a way to exchange the proceeds for Zambian Kwacha at a local currency booth.
