Coming in the wake of the news that Coinbase is working to add buy option for Litecoin on its platform is figures that show that all seems to be looking good for Litecoin as well as Ethereum as the next burgeoning digital currencies that will follow Bitcoin in importance in parts of Africa.
Despite there are over 700 digital currencies in existence, a newly-published infographic prepared by one of the top digital currency companies in the world with full presence in Africa shows that Nigerians are now buying into the two alternative currencies even though about 75 percent of those surveyed still prefer to hold only Bitcoin.
Litecoin beats Ethereum in Nigeria
Luno gathers that about 16.7 percent of respondents have Litecoin in Nigeria over 11.7 percent for Ethereum and at a far distance to Bitcoin’s 68.3 percent.
Though Ethereum is not new to Africa, it’s a little surprising that some Africans have been following Litecoin.
Some major African banks, including ABSA, are presently working on launching projects with the technology particularly for its smart contract feature and its applicability to loan programs.
But for Litecoin, which has recently been in the news of late following a rise in its price after it showed signs of signaling the activation of SegWit that many onlookers believe will add to its value and enhance its usefulness, not much of open interest has been shown for it in Africa.
The interest is likely to grow further going by some developments that continue to contribute to the image of the currency that describes itself as the silver to Bitcoin gold.
Buying LTC with fiat on Coinbase?
A co-founder of Coinbase has confirmed that the digital asset exchange company headquartered in California will work on adding Litecoin fiat buy option on its platform.
On April 5, Brian Armstrong in a tweet agrees to work on making “people easily buy LTC with fiat” on Coinbase.
Litecoin @GDAX vol is over $10M. @brian_armstrong, I think it's time we let people easily buy LTC with fiat on @coinbase. What do you say? ?
— Charlie Lee (@SatoshiLite) April 6, 2017
By the next day, GDAX reports that the 24-hour volume of Litecoin traded on its platform crossed one mln LTC for the first time.
Though GDAX is a trading platform launched by the Coinbase in 2016, there have been calls by some users for Coinbase to make Litecoin trading available on its platform too to which GDAX responded is being worked upon though no time frame was provided.
This is important because it will launch Litecoin buying opportunities to new markets where Coinbase is available currently in 33 countries mainly in Europe and North America.
In a related development, Chandler Guo, Angel Investor and Advisor, has been added as a member and community advisor in China to the Litecoin Foundation which seeks to promote, protect and standardize the Litecoin system.