Aptos Foundation partners with Daya and HashKey MENA to build regulated stablecoin corridor between Middle East and Africa

Cross-border payments between the Middle East and Africa are, by most measures, a mess. Fees are high, settlement times are slow, and informal channels fill the gap that formal finance leaves behind. A new three-way partnership announced on June 4 is betting that regulated stablecoins can fix that. HashKey MENA, the Aptos Foundation, and Pan-African payments startup Daya have signed a Corridor Pilot Agreement to build regulated B2B stablecoin settlement infrastructure linking the UAE and the broader MENA region with African markets, starting with Nigeria and the Naira. Why this corridor, and why now The World Bank puts average remittance fees for $200 transfers to Sub-Saharan Africa at 7.9%. On a $200 transfer, that is nearly $16 gone before the money arrives. Stablecoins have already found an audience in the region without much institutional help. According to the research compiled around the announcement, 79% of users in top African markets hold stablecoins, and the continent received more than $205 billion in on-chain stablecoin value between July 2024 and June 2025. The missing piece has been a compliant, enterprise-grade on-ramp and off-ramp structure that corporates can actua...