Circle (CRCL) Stock Partners With Sasai Fintech to Push USDC Into Africa

TLDR

Circle is partnering with African fintech Sasai to integrate USDC into its payment and mobile wallet infrastructure across Africa. The deal targets cross-border payments and remittances, where transaction costs in Sub-Saharan Africa exceed 7% in some countries. USDC is the second-largest stablecoin by market cap, sitting at around $78.6 billion. Crypto adoption in Sub-Saharan Africa jumped 52% in the 12 months through June 2025, with over $205 billion in onchain value received. Nigeria alone accounted for over $92 billion of that activity, driven by remittances and currency hedging.

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Circle Internet Group (NYSE: CRCL) has teamed up with Sasai Fintech, a business under Cassava Technologies, to bring USDC deeper into African payment corridors. The deal was announced on March 24, 2026.

LATEST: Circle is partnering with Sasai Fintech to harness USDC for cross-border payments in Africa, where remittance fees can exceed 7%. pic.twitter.com/aX6HTlj8uv

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The partnership will integrate USDC into Sasai’s existing infrastructure, which covers cross-border transfers, enterprise payments, and consumer mobile wallets. The goal is to cut costs and settlement times for both businesses and everyday users.

Circle Internet Group, CRCL

Remittance costs in Sub-Saharan Africa remain stubbornly high. Countries like Sierra Leone, Uganda, Angola, Botswana, and Zambia all had transaction costs above 7% in 2023, according to the World Bank. The UN has set a target of getting that figure below 3% globally.

Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire pointed to emerging markets as a key area of focus for the company, saying the partnership aims to extend USDC into high-growth payment corridors. Cassava Technologies founder Strive Masiyiwa said the integration could open up digital financial services for a wide range of businesses and consumers across the continent.

Sasai operates across multiple African markets, giving Circle a ready-made network to plug into. The two companies plan to explore how Circle’s full-stack platform can support Sasai’s enterprise and consumer customers in a practical way.

USDC currently holds around $78.6 billion in market cap, making it the second-largest stablecoin behind Tether’s USDT at roughly $184.1 billion, according to DefiLlama.

A Market Moving Fast

Crypto adoption in Sub-Saharan Africa grew 52% in the 12 months through June 2025. The region pulled in more than $205 billion in onchain value during that period, per Chainalysis data.

Nigeria led the way with over $92 billion in activity. South Africa, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Ghana followed. The drivers are consistent: remittances, cross-border payments, and demand for protection against local currency swings.

Other crypto firms are moving into the region too. Blockchain.com entered Ghana earlier this month as part of a wider African push, after reporting more than 700% growth in brokerage transaction volume in Nigeria since launching retail services there.

Regulators are starting to catch up. Ghana’s Securities and Exchange Commission approved 11 crypto trading platforms to enter a regulatory sandbox in March, under its new Virtual Asset Service Providers Act.

Stablecoins Finding Real-World Use

At the user level, stablecoins are increasingly being used for everyday transactions. Former UN under-secretary-general Vera Songwe said in January that remittances have become “more important than aid” in Africa, with stablecoins offering a faster, cheaper alternative to legacy transfer systems.

Africa Bitcoin Corporation executive chairman Stafford Masie said in March that Bitcoin is being used as actual money in some local economies.

Circle’s deal with Sasai puts it directly in the middle of this shift, connecting its regulated stablecoin infrastructure to one of the continent’s established digital payments networks.

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