Usecase Database

Leaf Global Fintech

Finance

Remittances & Cross-border payments

Stellar

Africa

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About

A UNICEF portfolio company, Leaf Global Fintech, developed a virtual bank for refugees and vulnerable populations. It enabled the storage and transfer of assets across borders without the need for a smartphone. Leaf increased access to financial services for 7,000+ individuals and impacted 40,000+ beneficiaries. IDT Corporation acquired the company.

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Chivo Wallet

The Government of El Salvador created the Chivo Wallet to send payments in dollars or Bitcoin. The El Salvador Central Reserve Bank reported that Chivo processed $50+ million in remittances in the first 5 months of 2022.

Circle

Circle began as a peer-to-peer payments technology company that now manages the stablecoin USD Coin (USDC). As of June 11, 2023, there’s $28+ billion USDC in circulation among 1.7 million holders. Circle is trusted by a number of large institutions including BlackRock, BNY Mellon, Mastercard, VISA, worldpay from FIS, MoneyGram, and Coinbase.

Kuva

Kuva enables businesses in emerging markets to make international payments faster and more cost effectively as compared with traditional means. Kuva has also launched Kuva Local, an e-commerce platform that allows locals and global customers to shop at local stores in a number of African countries.

MakerDAO

MakerDAO is a decentralized global reserve bank that created the Maker protocol that underpins its stablecoin (called “DAI”), as well as provides other functionalities (like governance).

Mento Protocol

The Mento Protocol powers stablecoins that can be used to make payments (especially cross-border ones) faster and cheaper. In 2021, Mercy Corps Ventures (MCV) partnered with the Celo Foundation and used the Mento Protocol for supporting un- and under-employed Kenyan youth with new and efficient income streams

Project Guardian

JPMorgan partnered with the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), DBS, and SBI Japan to test the potential of DeFi in traditional banking. In this pilot, JPM issued tokenized S$100,000 ($71,000) and traded it for tokenized yen with Japan’s SBI Digital Asset Holdings.

Valiu

Valiu, a Mercy Corps Ventures (”MCV”) portfolio company, aimed to address the crisis in Venezuela - 4.5+ million displaced Venezuelans fleeing to Columbia for refuge - by allowing faster, cheaper, and safer remittance payments to those left behind. Valiu facilitated $8.4+ million USD in payments before shutting down operations in December 2021.

Yellow Card

Yellow Card is the largest centralized cryptocurrency exchange in Africa. However, unlike in other centralized exchanges, the average Yellow Card customer stores money on the platform for about five minutes, using the exchange as a way to quickly send money across the border. Since its launch in 2019, Yellow Card has processed $1.75 billion in crypto remittances.