The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has become the fastest-growing crypto market, according to Chainalysis in the report.
1/ Middle East & North Africa (MENA) is the second-smallest yet fastest-growing #crypto market in this year’s Geography of Cryptocurrency Report.
In this 🧵we cover key trends in the region. Read the full sneak preview here! https://t.co/fZa6UL8YaQ
— Chainalysis (@chainalysis) October 5, 2022
From July 2021 to June 2022, the cumulative volume of transactions in digital assets amounted to $566 billion. This was 48% higher than in the previous 12 months.
In terms of growth, MENA is followed by Latin America and North America — 40% and 36% respectively.
MENA comprises more than 20 countries, three of which entered the company’s top-30 cryptocurrency adoption rankings: Turkey (12) , Egypt (14) and Morocco (24).
These examples illustrate well the reasons for interest in digital assets in the region, according to Chainalysis experts. During the reporting period, the Turkish lira depreciated by 80.5%, and the Egyptian pound weakened by 13.5%. This heightened the appeal of cryptocurrencies as a store of value.
Even more important was Egypt’s remittance market, which accounts for about 8% of the country’s GDP. The central bank has already launched a cryptocurrency-based payments corridor with the UAE, where many Egyptians work, Chainalysis noted.
In Egypt, over 12 months the volume of digital asset transactions increased more than threefold. In Turkey, growth was an order of magnitude more modest (10.5%), but it remains the region’s largest crypto market — $192 million or 34% of total transaction volume.
Analysts also drew attention to a drastic change in Afghanistan’s crypto-market situation following the Taliban’s ascent to power. In the 2021 cryptocurrency adoption index the country ranked 20th. After the regime change, dozens of dealers were arrested, and authorities equated digital assets with gambling and deemed them non-compliant with Islamic law.
Before the transfer of power, Afghanistan’s average monthly volume of cryptocurrency transactions was around $68 million. Under the fundamentalists, the figure collapsed to about $80,000 after a brief peak in September 2021.
Licenses or regulatory approvals for operating in the MENA region have been granted this year to a number of major crypto exchanges, including Binance, OKX, Huobi and FTX.
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