Glossary

Plain-English definitions of the terms behind moving money between Nigeria and the rest of the world.

A

Account freeze: When your bank blocks your account and you cannot move your money. Crypto-related transfers are a common trigger, especially money from strangers in peer-to-peer trades. Unfreezing it means paperwork and time. Using a platform that pays you directly avoids that route.
ACH: The normal way money moves between US banks. Most payments from clients and platforms like Upwork arrive this way. It is cheap or free to receive and takes one to three working days. The name on your account must match the name your client paid, or the payment fails.
Airtime-to-cash and gift cards: Older ways of turning value into naira: selling unused airtime, or selling a gift card code to a trader. Rates are poor and vary by trader. Fraud is common on both. Most people who used them have moved to selling stablecoins instead.
API: A way for one company's software to use another's, without a person clicking anything. A shop's website uses one to take payments. When a business is built on the Daya API, its own app calls Daya in the background. That is what moves the money.
Approval-in-Principle: A step towards a licence, not a licence. The regulator is saying a company has met the entry requirements and can continue. Busha and Quidax got one from the SEC in 2024. Platforms often describe it as being licensed, which is not what it means.
ARIP: The SEC's programme for crypto companies that are not fully licensed yet, short for Accelerated Regulatory Incubation Programme. Being in it means a firm is supervised while it works towards a licence. Fourteen firms were in it by August 2026. It is not a guarantee about your money.
Authorised dealer: A bank licensed to handle foreign currency business and approve trade forms. Fintechs cannot do this, however good their rates are. So you may pay a supplier through a fintech. The paperwork for an import or export still goes through a bank.

B

Beneficial ownership: Getting the economic benefit of something without your name on the certificate. With tokenised stocks and some apps, a company holds the share and you hold the claim on it. You get the price moves and the dividends. You are not on the company's register.
Beneficiary details: The information a payment needs to reach you: your name, your address, your account number and your bank. The sender types them in. If one of them is wrong, the money can bounce back days later. A fee is often taken on the way.
BEP20: Coins sent on BNB Chain. It usually costs less than Ethereum and most Nigerian apps accept it. Like every network, the person receiving has to support it. If you send BEP20 to an address that expects a different network, your money can get stuck for good.
Black market rate: The price of a dollar on the street, from dealers who are not licensed. People also call it the parallel market rate. It is almost always higher than the official rate. Most Nigerians cannot buy dollars at the official rate, so this is the price that affects them.
Block explorer: A free website where you can look up any crypto transfer. Paste the transaction ID and it shows whether it went through, when, and to which address. It is the way to check a payment yourself, instead of waiting for support to reply.
Brokerage account: An account with a licensed firm that buys and sells shares for you. The shares are held in your name, usually by a separate company. Apps like Bamboo, Trove and Hisa work this way, through a broker in the United States. You own the actual share.
Bureau de change: A licensed shop that buys and sells foreign currency. It sits between the banks and the street. Nigeria cancelled most of their licences in 2025. A few hundred were later let back in. So there are far fewer than before. An unlicensed street dealer is not one of these.
BVN: Your Bank Verification Number. It is 11 digits, linked to your fingerprints, and it covers every bank account you have in Nigeria. Any app that moves money will ask for it. You only ever get one, and it stays the same no matter how many accounts you open.

C

CAC registration: Registering your business with the Corporate Affairs Commission, which makes it a legal company. Business accounts need it. Without it you are trading as yourself, and your options are personal accounts with personal limits. You get a certificate and a registration number when it is done.
Capital gains tax: Tax on the profit when you sell something for more than you paid. It applies to shares and to crypto in Nigeria, under the 2025 tax laws. For individuals it is charged at the same rates as income tax, up to 25%. You pay on the gain, not the whole amount.
Card decline: When a foreign site refuses your card. It usually means your bank blocked foreign spending, your limit is used up, or the site rejects Nigerian cards. The site rarely tells you which. Check your bank's foreign spending rules first, before you blame the site.
CBN: The Central Bank of Nigeria. It controls the banks, the official dollar rate, and the rules about moving money in and out of the country. When the rules around your domiciliary account or a transfer change, this is usually where the change came from.
Chargeback: When a payment is reversed after it has arrived, usually because the sender disputed it. It is common with cards and rare with bank transfers. If it happens, the money leaves your balance again, sometimes weeks later, along with a fee in some cases.
Cold storage: Keeping crypto on a device that is not connected to the internet. It is the safest way to hold a large amount long term. It is also slower to use and easy to lose. Most people do not need it for everyday amounts.
Confirmation (blockchain): A network's way of saying a transfer has been accepted. More confirmations means it is harder to reverse. Apps wait for a set number before they credit you. That is why a transfer sits as pending for a few minutes even though you already sent it.
Contract address: The long code that identifies one exact token on a blockchain. Anyone can create a token and call it whatever they like. The address is the only way to be sure you are buying the right one. Copy it from a source you trust, never from a random post.
Conversion fee: What you are charged to change one currency into another, like dollars into naira. Sometimes it is a percentage shown on screen. Sometimes there is no visible fee and the cost sits inside the rate instead. Compare the naira you actually receive, not the fee on the label.
Correspondent bank: A bank in the middle of an international wire, passing money from one country's system to another. You never chose it and never see it. It can take its own fee from the amount, which is why a wire sometimes arrives smaller than expected.
Crypto exchange: A company where you buy and sell crypto at a price it quotes or on its own market. It holds your coins while they sit there. A peer-to-peer marketplace is different. There you trade with another person, and the app only holds the money.
Currency pair: Two currencies quoted against each other, like USD/NGN. The first one is what you are pricing. The second is what you are pricing it in. So USD/NGN at 1,500 means one dollar costs 1,500 naira, not the other way round.
Custodial wallet: A wallet where the app holds your coins for you, like money in a bank. You sign in with a password or your face, and support can help if something goes wrong. The trade-off is that you are trusting the company, and you cannot move funds if it fails.
Custodian: The company that holds the shares or money while someone else runs the app you use. It is not the app itself. That split matters if the app fails, because your assets sit somewhere else. Before you fund an account, check who the custodian is.

D

Deel: A platform companies use to hire and pay people in other countries, either as contractors or employees. If a client pays you through it, the money reaches you from Deel. It does not come from the client's own bank. You pick from the payout options Deel supports.
Deposit address: The long string of letters and numbers your coins are sent to. Copy and paste it, never type it. One wrong character and the money goes somewhere else, permanently. Always check the first and last few characters after you paste.
Devaluation: When a currency is officially made worth less against others. The naira has been devalued several times. If it happens, your naira savings buy fewer dollars than they did the week before. Prices of imported goods usually follow within weeks.
DexScreener: A free website that shows the price and trading activity of tokens, including brand new ones. Traders use it to check a token before buying. Some apps, including Daya Coins, let you paste a link from it. That buys the exact token you looked at, rather than one with a similar name.
Dividend: A share of a company's profit, paid to people who own its shares. Not every company pays one. If yours does, the money reaches you through the app you bought with, and how it arrives differs by app. Some pay it as cash, some buy more shares with it.
Dollar hedge: Holding some of your money in dollars so a falling naira hurts less. It protects what you already hold. It does not earn you anything on its own. Dollars lose value to inflation too, just more slowly than the naira has.
Domiciliary account: A bank account in Nigeria that holds dollars, pounds or euros instead of naira. Your money stays in that currency until you decide to change it. You open one at your own bank, with the usual paperwork. Some banks limit how much cash you can take out, so ask first.
Double taxation: Being taxed on the same income in two countries. Nigeria has treaties with some countries that stop it, or give you credit for tax already paid. Which one applies depends on where your client is. It is worth asking an accountant once.

E

ERC20: Coins sent on the Ethereum network. It is the oldest option and almost every app accepts it. The fee goes up when the network is busy, and it can be painful on a small transfer. Use it when the person receiving only takes Ethereum, or when the amount is large.
Escrow: Money held by a neutral third party until both sides do what they promised. Freelance platforms hold a client's payment this way before work starts. Crypto apps use it for peer-to-peer trades. It protects both people, as long as you trust whoever is holding it.
ETF: One investment that holds many shares at once. Buying a single unit gives you a slice of everything inside it, often hundreds of companies. It spreads your risk, so one bad company hurts less. It also means you never beat the group, because you own the whole group.
Exchange rate margin: The extra a provider adds to the real market rate, which is how it makes money without showing a fee. Work it out yourself. If the market says 1,500 and the app offers 1,450, the margin is 50 naira on every dollar.

F

Fiverr: A freelance marketplace where buyers order fixed-price services. Earnings sit in your Fiverr balance and clear after a waiting period. Withdrawals go out through a few named routes only. How you get paid depends on which of those works from Nigeria.
Foreign reserves: The dollars and other foreign currency the central bank holds. It is often reported as a big number in the news. A high number does not automatically mean a better street rate. What matters is how much of it is free to be sold.
Form A: The bank form for sending money abroad for services rather than goods. School fees, medical bills and subscriptions all use it. Your bank processes it. The rules changed in 2026 for money sent from your own domiciliary account. Ask your bank what applies to you.
Form M: The form you must complete to import goods into Nigeria. It is required whatever the value, and whether or not you are paying for the goods. Paying a supplier in USDT does not avoid it. Only a bank can process it, so imports still need a bank.
Form NXP: The form Nigerian exporters complete before goods leave the country. It is how the government tracks that the money from the sale comes back into Nigeria. A bank has to certify it. If you export anything, your bank will walk you through it.
Fractional share: A slice of one share. A single Amazon or Google share can cost hundreds of dollars, which puts it out of reach. Buying a fraction lets you put in a small amount instead, like one dollar, and own that share of it. You gain or lose in the same proportion.
FX Manual: The central bank's rulebook for foreign currency in Nigeria. It sets out what banks can do, what forms you need, and what your domiciliary account can be used for. It was updated in 2026. When a bank tells you something is not allowed, this is usually why.

G

Gas fee: What you pay the blockchain to move your coins, on top of the amount you send. It is not the app's fee. It goes to the network itself. The cost rises when the network is busy. On a small transfer it can even be more than the amount you are sending.

I

IBAN: The account format used across Europe and some other countries. It is one long string of letters and numbers that holds the country, the bank and the account. A European client will ask for yours. Sending an IBAN is how they pay you in euros or pounds.
IMTO: The licence a company needs to send money into Nigeria from abroad. Western Union, MoneyGram and Remitly have one. Since May 2026 they must pay you in naira at the official rate. So if someone abroad sends you money this way, you cannot receive it in dollars.
Inflation: Prices rising, so the same money buys less than it did. Nigeria's has run high for years. Say prices rise 25% in a year. Money sitting in a naira account has lost a quarter of what it could buy. The number in the account has not changed.
Instant buy vs trade: Two ways to buy the same coin. Instant buy is one button at a price the app sets. Trading means placing your own order on the market. Instant buy is easier and usually costs more, because the app's margin is built into the price.
Invoice: A bill you send a client. It says what you did, what they owe, and where to pay. A foreign client's finance team usually needs a date, an invoice number and your bank details. Wrong details on it are the most common reason a payment stalls.

K

KYB: The check a provider runs on a business before opening an account for it. It is the business version of KYC. Expect to send your CAC certificate, the directors' IDs, proof of address, and a note on what the company does. Having them ready saves days.
KYC: The identity check an app runs before it lets you send or receive money. It usually means your BVN or NIN, a photo of your ID, and a selfie. Bigger limits need more proof. Most delays happen when your name or date of birth does not match your bank records.

L

Limit order: An instruction to buy or sell only at a price you name. Your order waits until someone takes it. It protects you from a bad price, but it may never fill if the market does not reach your number. Useful when you are not in a hurry.
Liquidity: How much is available to buy and sell at a given moment. With plenty of it, a large trade barely moves the price. With little of it, the same trade pushes the price against you. It is the reason two apps can quote the same coin very differently.

M

Maker and taker: Two ways to trade. A maker adds an order to the list and waits. A taker accepts an order that is already there. Most platforms charge them different fees, and makers usually pay less. On Daya Pro the taker fee is 0% and the maker fee is 0.05%.
Market cap: The price of one token multiplied by how many exist. It is a rough measure of size. A token priced at a fraction of a kobo is not cheap if there are trillions of them. Compare market caps, not prices.
Market order: An instruction to buy or sell right now, at whatever price is available. It is the fastest way to trade. On a big order or a quiet market, the price can end up worse than the one you saw. Your order works down the list until it is filled.
Memecoin: A coin created around a joke, a person or an internet moment, with no business behind it. The price runs on attention alone. Some rise very fast and most fall just as fast. Only put in money you are prepared to lose completely, because plenty go to zero.
Mid-market rate: The price halfway between what buyers pay and sellers accept, before anyone adds a profit. Apps call it the real rate. For the naira there is no single one. Some apps follow the official rate and others follow the street rate, so their numbers look very different.
Multi-currency account: One account that holds more than one currency at a time. You can receive in dollars, hold them, and pay out in another currency without converting twice. Daya Business is one of these. It receives dollars, pounds and euros, and converts between dollars and naira.

N

NAFEM window: The official market where banks and licensed dealers trade dollars, and where the official rate comes from. You will see it written as NAFEM or NFEM. You cannot trade in it yourself. It matters because the rate set there is the one used for school fees, remittances and trade.
Naira card: A card tied to a naira account. Spending abroad or on foreign sites converts at the bank's rate, and banks set monthly limits. Many Nigerian banks capped or stopped foreign spending on these. Check your own bank's current limit before you rely on it.
Naira-only remittance rule: Since 1 May 2026, money sent home through Western Union, Remitly and similar apps arrives as naira. It is converted at the official rate. You cannot choose dollars any more. To keep dollars, the money has to come another way, like a bank wire or your own dollar account details.
Name matching: The name on your account has to match the name on the payment. Banks and apps check this to stop fraud. A middle name on one side and not the other can be enough to fail. Use the exact name on your ID everywhere, including on invoices.
Network (blockchain): The blockchain your coins travel on, like Tron, Ethereum, BNB Chain or Solana. The same coin can exist on several of them. You pick one when you send. The person receiving must accept that same one, or the money does not arrive and may be gone for good.
Nigeria Tax Act 2025: The law that reset how personal and company tax works in Nigeria, in force from January 2026. It is where the rules on crypto gains and the higher personal allowances come from. If an article says the rules changed, this is usually the change.
NIN: Your National Identification Number, from the national ID register. It is on your national ID card, and your SIM is registered with it. Banks and apps ask for it, sometimes instead of your BVN. Having both ready makes signing up for anything much faster.
Non-custodial wallet: A wallet where you hold the coins yourself and nobody can touch them. No company can freeze your funds. Nobody can help you either. Lose the phrase that opens it and the money is gone permanently, with no support line and no reset.

O

Off-ramp: The step where crypto becomes naira in your bank account. You sell the coin and the money is paid to your bank. Daya Coins does this without any peer-to-peer step and with no minimum. What matters most here is the rate and how fast the money lands.
Official rate: The dollar price banks and licensed dealers use, set in the market the central bank supervises. It is lower than the street price. You cannot get it directly. You get it through a bank, plus whatever the bank adds, and only for the reasons the rules allow.
On-ramp: The step where naira becomes crypto. You pay naira and receive a coin such as USDT. It can be an app you use yourself, or something a business builds into its own product. The rate and the fee at this step decide how much crypto you actually end up with.
Orderbook: A live list of everyone waiting to buy and everyone waiting to sell, with the price each one wants. You either accept a price on the list or add your own and wait. Daya Pro runs one for USDT and naira, with a minimum trade of one dollar.
OTC desk: A service that handles large trades privately instead of on the open market. Trading that size in public would move the price. You agree a price with the desk instead. Most set a high minimum, often 50,000 dollars, so smaller traders cannot use them.

P

P2P (peer-to-peer): Buying or selling crypto with another person instead of the app itself. The app holds the coins until the money lands. The rate often looks good. The risk is real. The money you receive can come from a fraud case, and that is how bank accounts get frozen.
Passkey: Signing in with your face, fingerprint or phone PIN instead of a password. There is no password for anyone to steal or guess. It is tied to your device, so a phishing site cannot capture it. More Nigerian apps are adding them.
Payoneer: A global payments company that gives you foreign account details and a card. Many freelancers use it because platforms pay into it directly. It charges to receive some payment types, and to withdraw. Rates and fees change. Check its current pricing before you compare.
Payout: The moment money leaves a platform and lands in someone's bank account. When a company says it pays out in two days, it means this step. Different from the payment itself, which is when the client sends it. Fees and delays usually happen at this stage.
Pegged and depegged: A pegged coin is meant to hold a fixed value, usually one dollar. The company behind it is supposed to hold real dollars to back that. Depegged means it has slipped below, even briefly. It has happened to real stablecoins before.
Proof of reserves: A platform publishing evidence that it holds the customer assets it says it holds. It is a snapshot on one day, checked by someone outside. It does not show what the platform owes elsewhere. So treat it as one comfort, not a guarantee.

R

Rate lock: A promise that the rate you are shown now is the rate you get, for a set time. It protects you between agreeing a price and the money arriving. Without one, the rate can move while a payment is in flight and you receive less than you expected.
Receiving fee: What is taken from a payment before it reaches you, just for arriving. Some providers charge a percentage, some a flat amount, some nothing. Take a 1,000 dollar payment. A 1% receiving fee is 10 dollars. That is gone before you touch the money.
Remittance: Money sent home by someone living abroad, usually to family. It is treated differently from money you earn from clients. Remittances through the big transfer apps now arrive as naira. Freelance income is not a remittance, even when it comes from the same country.
Routing number: A nine-digit code that identifies a bank in the United States. A sender needs it along with your account number. It is sometimes called an ABA number. If you have virtual dollar account details, the routing number comes with them.
RTP (real-time payments): Instant bank transfers in the United States, which arrive in seconds instead of days. Not every sender supports them yet. Where they are supported, money can land at the weekend. Most freelancer payments still arrive on the older, slower route.
Rug pull: When the people behind a token take the money and disappear, leaving the token worthless. It happens most with new tokens nobody has heard of. Warning signs: anonymous team, a tiny number of holders, and a price that only goes up.

S

Sandbox: A test version of a payment system, with fake money. Developers use it to check that everything works before real customers arrive. Nothing in it is real, so a successful test payment there does not mean money moved. The Daya API has one.
SEC Nigeria: Nigeria's Securities and Exchange Commission. It regulates investing: shares, funds, and now digital assets. Investment apps and crypto platforms answer to it, while banks and transfers answer to the central bank. Its public register lets you check whether a firm is really licensed.
Seed phrase: The 12 or 24 words that open a wallet you hold yourself. Anyone with the words has the money, so treat them like cash. Write them on paper and keep them offline. No real company will ever ask for them, and anyone who does is stealing from you.
Self-assessment: Working out your own tax and filing it yourself, instead of an employer doing it. Freelancers and business owners in Nigeria do this. You report what you earned and pay what you owe, by the deadline. Keeping records through the year makes it manageable.
Settlement: When money is finally, properly yours and cannot be pulled back. A transfer can show as sent and still not be settled. This is why a payment can appear in an app and then disappear. Banks and blockchains each have their own settlement times.
Slippage: When the price you get is not the price you saw. It happens between clicking and the trade completing, usually because there was not enough at your price. It hits big orders and quiet markets hardest. A limit order avoids it, at the cost of maybe not trading at all.
Spread: The difference between the rate an app gets and the rate it gives you. It is how a provider makes money without charging a fee. Say the real rate is 1,380 and you are offered 1,350. That gap is the spread, and it costs you 30,000 naira on 1,000 dollars.
Stablecoin: A coin made to stay at one price, usually one US dollar, so it does not jump around like Bitcoin. Nigerians use them to hold dollars, get paid and send money. The company behind a coin is supposed to hold real dollars to back it. Your money is not insured.
Stablecoin corridor: A route for moving money between two countries using stablecoins in the middle. Naira goes in one end, dollars come out the other. It is usually faster and cheaper than a bank wire. The two ends are where the fees and the rules sit.
Stamp duty: A small tax on certain transactions. On crypto in Nigeria it is 1.5%, and the buyer pays it, not the seller. It is separate from any tax on your profit. Your exchange usually handles it, so check your statement to see what was taken.
Sub-broker: A licensed firm that places trades through a bigger broker. Most Nigerian investing apps are set up this way. The app is the part you see, and a licensed firm underneath does the regulated work. You can check that firm on the SEC register before you sign up.
SWIFT: The system banks use to send money from one country to another. People call it a wire. It works for big amounts and most currencies, and takes one to five working days. Other banks handle it along the way and can take a cut, so less arrives than was sent.
SWIFT code (BIC): A code that identifies a specific bank anywhere in the world, also called a BIC. It is eight or eleven characters. A sender needs it for an international wire, on top of your account number. Your bank publishes its own on its website.

T

Tax Identification Number (TIN): Your Tax Identification Number, the number the tax office knows you by. You need one to file a return, and often to register a company or open a business account. It is free. Many Nigerians already have one issued automatically against their BVN or NIN.
Tokenised stock: A token that tracks the price of a real share, like Apple or Tesla. You get the price movement without holding the share certificate yourself. Daya Stocks works this way, from one dollar, at 0.25% a trade. You sell in the app and withdraw naira.
TRC20: USDT and other coins sent on the Tron network. Nigerians used it for years because it was the cheapest way to send. Some Nigerian apps now charge more for Tron than for other networks. Check the fee in your app before you send, instead of assuming Tron is cheapest.
Two-factor authentication: A second step at login, on top of your password. It can be a code by text, a code from an app, or a key. Texts are the weakest, because a SIM swap defeats them. An authenticator app is the easy upgrade.

U

Upwork: A freelance platform where clients hire and pay through the site. Money sits in your Upwork balance until you withdraw it. Nigerians usually withdraw to a dollar account or a local bank. Each route has its own fee and waiting time.
USDC: Another coin made to be worth one US dollar. A company called Circle issues it and publishes monthly reports on what backs it. Fewer Nigerian apps support it than USDT. Check that the app or person you are sending to accepts USDC before you send any.
USDT (Tether): A coin made to always be worth one US dollar. It is the one most Nigerians use to hold or send money in dollars. It lives on several blockchains, and the one you pick changes the fee and who can receive it. A company backs it, so it is not a bank account.

V

VASP: Virtual Asset Service Provider: the official name for a company that lets people buy, sell or hold crypto. In Nigeria they are supposed to register with the SEC. If a platform holds your money, it is worth checking whether it is on the SEC's own list.
Viral token: A token that is spiking right now because people are talking about it. It might be a memecoin or a new project. The window is short, often hours. Prices move both ways, and the same speed that makes money for early buyers loses it for late ones.
Virtual account: A bank account number created for one customer or one purpose, sitting under a bigger real account. Apps use them so each customer has their own number to pay into. Daya Coins gives you one in naira, which is how you fund it without any peer-to-peer trade.
Virtual dollar account: US account details in your own name, given to you by an app instead of a bank branch. Any client who can pay a US account can pay you. The money stays in dollars until you change it to naira. Daya Borders takes 0% on dollars and euros coming in.
Virtual dollar card: A card that exists only as numbers on a screen, funded in dollars. People use them for subscriptions and foreign sites. Providers charge to create one and take a percentage on top-ups. Cards get blocked or withdrawn fairly often, so do not depend on one.
Volume (24h): How much of a token was traded in the last day. It tells you whether you can sell again easily. Low volume means your sale could move the price against you, or sit unfilled. High volume means plenty of people on both sides.

W

Webhook: A message one system sends another the moment something happens, instead of waiting to be asked. A payment app uses one to tell a business that money has landed. It is the reason an app can update your balance the second a transfer clears.
Wire transfer: A bank-to-bank transfer, usually international. It is the older, slower route, and it can pass through banks in the middle. Each one may take a cut. It normally takes one to five working days, and it costs more than the newer local routes.
Withdrawal fee: What you pay to move money out of an app to your bank. It can be a flat amount or a percentage, and it often differs by route. Getting money out is usually where the cost is, so check it before you put money in.
Withholding tax: Tax taken off the top of a payment before you receive it, instead of later. On crypto in Nigeria, 1% is taken from the total sale amount when you sell coins like Bitcoin. Stablecoins such as USDT and USDC are exempt from it under the tax guidelines.
Wrong network transfer: Sending a coin on one network to someone who only supports another. The money leaves your side and does not arrive. Sometimes the receiving company can recover it, often for a fee. Sometimes it is gone. Check the network on both sides before you send.