Business
CBN Explains MSMEs Fund
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said last Saturday that the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development fund was not meant to bail out distressed micro-finance banks.
Director, Other Financial Institutions Development (OFID) department of the CBN, Mr Olufemi Fabanwo, made the clarification at the 2nd Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the National Association of Micro Finance Banks (NAMB) in Abuja.
Fabanwo said the fund, which was initially established as Micro Finance Development Fund (MDF), was changed to MSMEs Development Fund.
“The MSMEs fund is not medicine for those who are weak, the MSME fund is going to be accessed by institutions that have shown proven record of performance; it is not for any micro finance bank.
“It is not a bailout fund. There is going to be a social window for capacity building in any area that will augur well for the development of the sub-sector.’’
The director said CBN was not satisfied with the level of returns rendition and the audited accounts of micro-finance banks.
He said that only about 70 per cent rendition had been recorded by the apex bank since the end of the last financial year.
Fabanwo, however, added that the MFBs had recorded greater stability after the September ‘sanitation’ carried out by the apex bank in which 244 licences of MFBs were revoked.
He stressed the need for micro-finance banks to update their subscriptions annually, warning that the apex bank would not hesitate to penalise defaulters.
The director said the AGM recorded 220 participants in 2011 compared to 400 this year.
He said there was need for improvement as the figure only represented a quarter of the expected 1,708 participants.
Fabanwo observed that the shortfall in attendance indicated that apathy to the activities of the association was still very apparent.
Commenting on the new development fund, the immediate past president of NAMB, Chief Matthias Omeh, said the announcement by CBN of the change in the name of MDF to MSME fund was new to him.
“I am just hearing about it for the first time from the Director of OFID, that they have changed the MDF to MSMEs,’’ he said, adding that although he had not seen the details, micro-finance banks still fall into the range of small and medium scale enterprises.
Reports say the highlight of the event was the election and swearing-in of new national officers.
The immediate past first National Vice President Mr Jethro Akun was sworn-in as president of the association.
Cornerstone of Financial Services
A survey of more than 1 000 global finance leaders undertaken by digital payment network Ripple shows that 72% of respondents believe they need to offer a digital asset solution to remain competitive.
According to Ripple, leaders from the banking, fintech, corporate and asset management sector have made it clear that the “digital asset revolution is happening now”.
“Digital assets are quickly becoming a cornerstone of financial services, underpinned by progressive regulation, growing interest from Tier-1 banks, a steady consumer shift from banks to fintech providers, and booming stablecoin adoption,” Ripple says.
The survey was conducted in early 2026 and the findings released in March.
Stablecoin Boon or Bane?
Ripple has experienced significant success in the stablecoin sector since launching its Ripple USD (RLUSD) stablecoin in 2024.
With a market cap of $1.56 billion, it is considered a major regulated player in the market.
No doubt the platform was pleased to learn through its own survey that financial leaders were most bullish about stablecoins.
Roughly three-quarters of respondents believed they could boost cash-flow efficiency and unlock trapped working capital.
Ripple noted that finance leaders were thinking about stablecoins as more than “just a new way to execute payments”; instead, they viewed them as effective tools for treasury management.
In March 2026, Ripple began testing a new trade finance model built around RLUSD in a bid to increase the speed of cross-border payments.
The pilot initiative, developed alongside supply chain finance company Unloq [https://unloq.com], is running on the XRP Ledger inside a testing framework developed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore.
The Asian city-state is one of the platform’s biggest growth markets.
The idea behind the project is to see whether stablecoin-based settlement can streamline trade finance, too often hampered by reliance on intermediaries and slow reconciliation.
The only potential drawback is that if the initiative takes off, the Ripple to USD price could be negatively affected.
Ripple has always championed its native XRP token as a bridge asset, the “middleman” in the process of a financial institution turning dollars in the US into pounds in the UK, for example.
Ripple converts dollars into XRP and then back into pounds.
If RLUSD can do exactly the same thing, questions will be asked about XRP’s relevance.
That is a bridge Ripple will have to cross if it gets to that point.
Tokenisation Partners
Another interesting finding from Ripple’s survey is that most banks and asset managers are seeking tokenisation partners to help execute their strategies.
Some 89% of respondents said digital asset storage and custody were top priority. “Token servicing/lifecycle management also ranks highly for banks at 82%, while asset managers place greater emphasis on primary distribution at 80%,” Ripple found.
The survey also revealed that just more than half of fintechs and financial institutions want an infrastructure provider that can offer a “one-stop-shop solution”. This rose to 71% among corporate financial leaders.
Ripple attributes this to institutions and firms wanting uncomplicated, cohesive systems.
Infrastructure Rules
In its final analysis, Ripple says companies across the board are looking for partners and solutions that are “secure, compliant, battle-tested and that enable growth and execution”.
“The message is clear: infrastructure decisions made today will shape competitive positioning tomorrow.”
No surprise that this is precisely where Ripple is placing much of its focus.
