Okafor Ifeanyi, a Nigerian student in Scotland, provides a personal perspective on the debate on fintech versus blockchain in this interview with Techpression
During a chat with Techpression, our writer stated that while scrolling through social feeds recently, he came across a simple but powerful question: Why are transfers on OPay, Moniepoint, and other mobile banks so much faster than traditional commercial banks?
Curiosity got the better of our correspondent, so he dug deeper. In the process, he came across an insightful post by financial analyst Oluwanishola Akeju, who explained that fintech wallets rely on wallet-based systems and modern payment networks, unlike banks, which are still tied to slower interbank chains.
That raises a bigger question: How does this compare to blockchain, the backbone of cryptocurrency?
To explore this further, Techpression connected with Okafor Ifeanyi, a Nigerian project management student studying in Scotland. His personal experiences with remittance tools like OPay, Lemify, and traditional banks offered a real-world perspective to the fintech-versus-blockchain conversation.
How fintech wallets outpace legacy banking
OPay and Moniepoint have become household names in Nigeria precisely because their transfers feel instantaneous—the secret lies in their operational design.
Instead of routing every transaction through the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS), these platforms maintain pooled settlement accounts in multiple commercial banks.
When you send money from OPay to a GTBank account, OPay doesn’t wait for interbank settlement. It debits your wallet internally and immediately credits the recipient from its GTBank account.
As Mr. Akeju noted in his post, “OPay has accounts with GTBank, Access Bank, FirstBank, UBA and others. So when you transfer from your OPay wallet to GTBank, OPay simply debits you and credits from its own GTBank account to yours, making the process almost instant.”
This system helps bypass legacy delays. He further explained, “Moniepoint and OPay transactions are faster because they rely more on wallet-based closed systems, direct payment switches, and modern infrastructure, while commercial banks are still tied to legacy settlement systems.”
The numbers back this up. Moniepoint processed 5.2 billion transactions in 2023, totalling more than $150 billion in value, approaching half of all NIBSS activity for the year. OPay and Moniepoint account for nearly 58 per cent of Nigeria’s 1.5 million POS agents, indicating how deeply embedded these fintechs have become in everyday commerce.
The human cost of banking delays
For many, traditional banks’ slowness is more than an inconvenience; it’s a significant disruption. Okafor Ifeanyi shared a frustrating experience from the diaspora:
“My phone spoiled… I couldn’t even switch [my banking app] to Apple. They directed me to go and get some documents stamped by a lawyer or a council chairman just to switch phones. It’s not worth it. I just switched to Opay.”
His story reflects a bigger issue: traditional banks tend to focus so much on control and security rules that they forget about the customer experience, leaving people frustrated with needless delays.
The trade-offs of fintech speed: Centralised control
This efficiency comes with trade-offs. These systems are centralised, meaning users must trust the fintech companies to manage and reconcile ledgers accurately. System outages can lock millions out of their funds, and regulators retain the power to freeze accounts.
As Okafor pointed out, this centralisation grants these companies significant power: “They are capable of [increasing charges]… what they just need is all those their associates, if they agreed, once they agreed, they execute it. They don’t need to consult us.”
Furthermore, these wallets are largely domestic—excellent for Naira transfers within Nigeria but not designed for seamless cross-border payments across Africa, let alone beyond.
So, while fintech wallets demonstrate remarkable efficiency, their model remains vulnerable to the classic challenges of control, dependency, and limited reach. This is precisely where blockchain enters the conversation with a radically different proposition.
Where blockchain differs
Unlike fintechs, blockchain does not depend on pooled settlement accounts or centralised ledger reconciliation. It operates on a decentralised ledger, validated by a global network of nodes.
Transactions are confirmed by mathematical consensus—transparently and without a single point of failure.
This kind of architecture gives blockchain three powerful advantages. First, it brings transparency. Every transaction is logged on a public ledger that cannot be altered, making it possible for anyone to verify what happened.
Unlike traditional banking, where you depend on the bank’s records, blockchain provides a system in which trust is built into the technology.
Second, it creates a truly global reach. Sending value across countries becomes as seamless as sending an email. Whether someone is moving funds from Lagos to London or from Abuja to Accra, the process is the same—fast, borderless, and without the heavy fees and delays that plague conventional international transfers.
Finally, it offers absolute autonomy. Instead of relying on a bank or company to hold your money in their servers, users have cryptographic control of their assets through private keys. That means ownership is direct and secure, not dependent on whether a third party approves or denies your access.
Meanwhile, speed varies across blockchains. Bitcoin can take minutes, but newer networks like Solana or Polygon achieve settlement in seconds, rivalling fintech apps while layering on the benefits of decentralisation.
Why this matters in Nigeria and Africa
This debate is critical within the African context. Nigeria is a global leader in fintech adoption, with OPay and Moniepoint processing billions of dollars monthly. Yet, it is also a crypto giant.
Chainalysis and Consensys consistently rank Nigeria among the top countries for crypto adoption. According to a Punch report, nearly 47 per cent of Nigerians actively use crypto, with 99 per cent awareness and 84 per cent already holding wallets.
Nigerians moved $57 billion in crypto in a year via stablecoins like USDT. The reasons are pragmatic. Fintech solves local bottlenecks; crypto solves global ones. Freelancers use USDT to bypass Naira volatility for international payments.
Okafor, who uses traditional rails for family reasons, acknowledges: “I know blockchain is the future… it depends on who they are sending it to… My family is not interested, and they see it as stressful.” This highlights the current adoption gap and the immense potential as awareness spreads.
Traders hedge against inflation, and families abroad remit funds without traditional banking friction.
The Future: When fintech and blockchain converge
The most exciting possibility is not fintech versus blockchain, but fintech with blockchain. Imagine opening your OPay app and sending USDT or another stablecoin directly across borders, just as easily as sending Naira to a GTBank account.
Moniepoint, with its vast agent network, could serve as the bridge between fiat cash and digital assets, making blockchain accessible even in rural towns.
This is not far-fetched. Central banks are already experimenting with CBDCs like Nigeria’s eNaira, while global payment providers test stablecoin integrations.
The next phase of Africa’s financial transformation may be a hybrid: fintech platforms may provide a user-friendly interface and local trust, while blockchain may supply the global rails and decentralised security.
Take away right?
So why do OPay and Moniepoint transfers feel instant while banks still frustrate us with delays? The answer lies in their infrastructure: wallet-based systems, settlement bank accounts, and modern technology that bypasses legacy bottlenecks.
The financial expert (Oluwanishola Akeju) observed that their speed comes from moving away from interbank systems and building modern payment switches.
But blockchain takes the idea further. Where fintech provides centralised speed, blockchain promises decentralised freedom.
One is designed for national efficiency, the other for global autonomy. Fintech has shown Africans how fast and accessible payments can be. Blockchain takes that promise to the world stage.
Perhaps the future of money in Africa will not be a choice between them but a marriage of fintech’s speed and blockchain’s transparency and borderless reach.