cNGN, the Naira stablecoin regulated by Nigeria’s SEC, is now live on Celo, the most widely adopted blockchain for stablecoin payments. Celo Core Co. will begin the governance process to enable the asset as gas to streamline transactions and simplify onboarding. Bringing a compliant, fiat-backed Naira to Celo unlocks low-cost settlement across onchain FX, lending and borrowing, DeFi, everyday payments, and remittances, which brought $21.8 billion into Nigeria in 2025 alone.
Crosschain FX liquidity network Textile FX is a day one partner, offering cNGN trades against Tether’s USD₮ on the network with institutional liquidity led by Tribeca Park Capital. Ahead of today’s launch, Textile FX has onboarded 78 OTC and cross-border payment companies in Nigeria, and cleared over $4M in trading volume last month.
The Celo ecosystem has a long-established history of innovation in Nigeria, the country where Opera’s self-custodial stablecoin wallet MiniPay first went live in 2023 and home to standout ecosystem applications including BitGifty and Partna. Nigeria accounts for roughly 60 percent of all stablecoin inflows into sub-Saharan Africa since 2019, ranking sixth worldwide in crypto adoption. As residents embrace crypto payments at massive scale, FX trading and local stablecoin-enabled use cases are the next frontier of onchain activity in the region.
cNGN is the eighth fiat-backed stablecoin in eight days to deploy on Celo, bringing the robust ecosystem to 32 stablecoins. The Nigerian Naira stablecoin follows USA₮, the US Dollar stablecoin issued by Anchorage Digital Bank and backed by Tether, launching on Celo in its first expansion beyond Ethereum, and Ripio, the leading crypto infrastructure and digital finance platform in Latin America, deploying wFIAT stablecoins. The wFIAT deployment, also supported by Textile FX, brought Argentine Peso, Brazilian Real, Mexican Peso, Colombian Peso, Chilean Peso, and Peruvian Sol stablecoins to the network.
“Local currency stablecoins have been a core focus of the Celo ecosystem since mainnet launch in 2020, and Nigeria is one of the corridors where the case is clearest,” said Dr. Markus Franke, Celo Core Co. Global Head of Stablecoins. “Bringing cNGN to Celo puts the regulated Naira stablecoin on rails where transfers cost a fraction of a cent and settle in an instant, on a network powering payments for millions worldwide.”
“Nigeria is leading much of the world in stablecoin adoption,” said Uyoyo Ogedegbe, Managing Director at cNGN. “Our mission since launching cNGN has been to enable scalable, real-world use cases across Africa and beyond. Celo extends that work into one of the deepest stablecoin ecosystems, where cNGN now sits alongside more than 30 other stablecoins.”
cNGN is backed 1:1 by Naira-denominated reserves held at approved Nigerian commercial banks, with reserve attestations audited and published monthly. The asset is issued by WrappedCBDC Limited.
Explore Textile’s onchain FX solutions with cNGN on Celo: cNGN<>USD₮
Developers can integrate Celo-native cNGN into their existing applications or build new applications with the Naira stablecoin today. Visit docs.celo.org to get started.