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Sports Teams in Nigeria to Embrace blockchain and Crypto as SEC Nigeria endorses Cryptocurrencies

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@uyobong
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One of the challenges that I faced while trying to onboard the Nigerian professional Football League (NPFL) teams to Hive and consequently to the Hive blockchain was hinged to the fact that cryptocurrencies had not been officially considered a legal currency in Nigeria. This is because most of the teams are owned by State governments and government parastatals.

I remember talking with a manager of one of the sports team owned by my state government. The manager was personally convinced but according to him, he cannot present it the Board to request for financing as there is no regulation of digital assets in the country yet.

There beamed a green light few days ago when the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in Nigeria published on Friday, 11th September, 2020 endorsed cryptocurrencies and obliges to regulate crypto-token or crypto-coin investments when the character of the investments qualifies as securities transactions.

The memo which was titled "Statement On Digital Assets And Their Classification And Treatment", recognizes "Digital assets offerings" as alternative investment opportunities for the investing public. This development would make the marketing of cryptocurrency project in Nigeria quite easier and interesting. I'm sure that most of the SEC officials may have been involved in one crypto or the other but needed to use their constitutional powers to allow for open trading in the stocks market.

Section 13 of the Investment and Securities Act, 2007 conferred powers on the Commission as the apex regulator of the Nigerian capital market to regulate investments and securities business in Nigeria. In line with these powers, the SEC has adopted a three-pronged objective to regulate innovation, hinged on safety, market deepening and providing solution to problems. This will guide its strategy, its regulations and its interaction with innovators seeking legitimacy and relevance.

The full content of Nigeria SEC's endorsement can be read here:
https://sec.gov.ng/statement-on-digital-assets-and-their-classification-and-treatment/

This development actually took about three years from an initial stand of the Commission as at 2017. Their earlier cautionary memo has the details here. this shows that the world is beginning to appreciate and adopt cryptocurrencies in their economies. This is a great development. This means there would be more adoption.

We are aware of the strong population and fanbase that sports have. An average football team in Nigeria has at least 100,000 supporters on Facebook. The stadiums are always filled to at least 40% capacity during NPFL matches. Now that SEC Nigeria endorses, getting the sport teams to adopt crypto becomes easy.

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With the likes of Juventus FC and FC Barcelona adopting cryptocurrency, Nigerian teams would have a justification to follow suit. While we understand the huge financial investment that requires setting up a blockchain to mine cryptocurrency and having it listed on an exchange. This therefore gives an advantage to the hive blockchain where transactions are free except a few tokens required to set-up tribes at the second layer.

I'll sure have them land first on the SPortstalksocial community to see how awesome it is to build a sports utility token on the second layer of the Hive blockchain. In the next few months, we'll be having a huge onboarding to Hive from this end and towards the Sportstalksocial community. That would be a huge win for SPORTS and HIVE.

It's important to get positioned to make the most from this opportunity opening up for the Hive blockchain. Like I said sometime ago, we do not need investors, we need passionate users to join the blockchain for things to change positively. No other sector have passionate users like sports.

Let's see as things turn out in the coming days...

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