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Nigeria has emerged as the second biggest market for bitcoin, trading over 60,000 bitcoins, valued at $566 million, between 2015 and 2020.

Since 2017, the volume of bitcoin trade in Nigeria has increased by 19% while the highest volume of trade (20,504.50) was recorded in 2020, according to reports.

The West African nation and Africa’s biggest economy trails only the United States on Paxful, a leading peer-to-peer bitcoin market place. The sharp rise in bitcoin trade, particularly in 2020, has been attributed to the lockdown and the “End SARS” protest across Nigeria.

During the End SARS protests, the Nigerian authorities accused some foreigners and members of the Nigerian diaspora of funding the protest. And in the government’s quest to end the demonstrations, the Central Bank of Nigeria instructed private banks to freeze several organizations’ and individuals’ accounts to stop the flow of funds supporting the protests, according to Human Rights Watch.

To bypass the restrictions, the protesters switched to using bitcoin in order to raise funds to sustain the pressure on the federal government to act on police brutalities and other human rights abuses by the country’s security forces. The change to bitcoin was in no small part due to explicit advice by Twitter CEO, Jack Dorsey, who supported the protest to the anger of certain officials of the Nigerian government.

According to reports, bitcoin accounted for around 40% of the nearly $400,000 raised within a week.

The coronavirus-forced lockdown in Nigeria also saw the bitcoin trade skyrocketing, recording a 37% increase in new registrations. Paxful, which controls 52% of the bitcoin market worldwide, is the most popular bitcoin platform in Africa and Nigerians make up a quarter of its customer base with 1.3 million registered accounts.

“They mostly use the platform for peer-to-peer and arbitrage trading,” says Nena Nwachukwu, Paxful Nigeria regional manager. “Remittance is also a popular use case.” Nwachukwu says bitcoin transfers are “much cheaper and faster than using traditional money transfer operators.”

Also, cross border challenges in money transfer accounts for the growing using of bitcoins, according to Paxful chief executive officer and co-founder Ray Yussef. “Africa’s largest economy has problems and restrictions in sending and receiving money from inside and outside its borders.”

The U.S, which tops the bitcoin market, recorded a 32% decline in the number of bitcoin trades executed in 2020 while the Philippines recorded the biggest increase with 7,339% more bitcoin traded in 2020 compared to 2019, according to bitcoin.com.

China traded $181.3 million worth of bitcoin in the last five years, Canada $131.1 million and the UK $119.4 million to complete the top five bitcoin trading economies.

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According to a survey conducted by the International Franchise Association, Black franchise owners only account for 8% of the total market. To create more generational wealth and economic opportunities for those within the Black community, Pepsi has committed $2.5 million to establish a new wave of Black franchise owners across the country.

The Pathways to Black Franchise Ownership program was created in partnership with Multicultural Foodservice & Hospitality Alliance (MFHA) and 4thMVMT, an organization dedicated to advancing social change for Black and Latinx people within the U.S. based in Los Angeles. Earlier this year, Pepsi announced they would be committing $400 million to the Black community.

“The foodservice industry is one of most diverse, made up of so many cultures and backgrounds, but that diversity isn’t reflected in business ownership,” said Scott Finlow, Global CMO of PepsiCo Food Service, to BLACK ENTERPRISE via email. “Franchises are a growing segment of the restaurant industry so we think it’s important to address this space as well as independently owned restaurants.”

He went on the say that the reason behind forming the new program was to “create more opportunities for franchise ownership, which can ultimately lead to positive impact for Black individuals, families, and communities.”

Finlow went on to explain that a number of franchises have already expressed interest in the program and says that the company hopes “to build and sustain the program will catalyze positive change, motivate others to join us in reaching our goal of creating 100 Black-owned franchise businesses by the end of 2022 – and continue growing that number.”

Potential applicants can apply for the new program starting in early 2021.