# Nigeria's Daya raises a US$2.4m pre-seed to build stablecoin cross-border payment rails for African businesses
> Hivemind Capital leads with the Aptos Foundation, Lattice and Alliance; ex-Circle and Helicarrier founders offer virtual dollar accounts settling into the naira

**Meta:** type: event · date: 2026-06-24 · heads: Whose Money, The Quiet Shift · 5 takes · 3 lenses · 3 regions

## Summary

Lagos-based [Daya](/en/entity/crypto-web3) closed a US$2.4m pre-seed on 24 June 2026 led by Hivemind Capital, with Lattice, Alliance, Globelink and the [Aptos Foundation](/en/entity/aptos) participating. Co-founded by Aleph Lasebikan and Paul Joe, alumni of stablecoin issuer Circle and early African exchange Helicarrier, Daya offers African businesses virtual US-dollar accounts, instant cross-border payments and stablecoin settlement into local currencies, starting with the [Nigerian naira](/en/entity/nigeria). Earlier in June, Dubai-based exchange HashKey MENA named Daya its African payments partner for an Aptos-built UAE-to-Africa stablecoin corridor, positioning the startup in enterprise stablecoin rails rather than consumer crypto.

## The split

Crypto-industry outlets frame Daya as part of the enterprise stablecoin-rails wave, dollar settlement abstracted behind a business bank account. Nigerian tech press centres the practical problem: dollar scarcity and slow, costly cross-border transfers that stablecoins can route around. The two readings agree on the mechanism but differ on the subject, a crypto story to one, a trade-finance fix to the other.

## By the numbers

- US$2.4m, pre-seed round.
- Hivemind Capital, lead, with the Aptos Foundation.
- Naira, the first local settlement currency.
- Circle and Helicarrier, the founders' prior firms.
- June 24, 2026, announced.

## Why it matters

Stablecoins are becoming Africa's cross-border settlement layer where dollars are scarce and correspondent banking is slow, and a UAE-to-Africa corridor built on Aptos shows Gulf exchanges wiring into the continent. Daya is small, but it sits at the practical edge where crypto stops being speculation and becomes payments infrastructure.

## What to watch

- Whether the HashKey MENA UAE-to-Africa corridor goes live at scale.
- Nigerian and regional regulatory treatment of stablecoin settlement.
- Expansion beyond the naira into other African currencies.

## Regional takes (batched by bias / lens)

### crypto industry
- **Unchained** (United States, en) — Details the stablecoin-neobank model and the founders' Circle and Helicarrier pedigree, framing Daya within the enterprise stablecoin-rails wave rather than consumer crypto.
  > "Daya raises $2.4M to build stablecoin payment stack for African businesses."
  Source: https://unchainedcrypto.com/daya-raises-2-4-million-to-build-a-stablecoin-payment-stack-for-african-businesses-unchained/

### Nigerian tech
- **Tech.Africa** (Nigeria, en) — Local Nigerian framing of the naira-settlement corridor and the cross-border payment pain points Daya targets for African businesses.
  > "Nigeria's Daya raises $2.4m for stablecoin payments."
  Source: https://tech.africa/daya-stablecoin-payments-raise/

### unlabelled
- **TheStreet Crypto** (United States, en) — 
  Source: https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/innovation/daya-raises-2-4-million-from-aptos-and-others-to-power-african-cross-border-payments
- **Crypto Briefing** (United States, en) — 
  Source: https://cryptobriefing.com/circle-helicarrier-alumni-raise-seed-round-stablecoin-startup-daya/
- **African-Startups** (Africa, en) — 
  Source: https://african-startups.com/news/funding/lagos-based-daya-raises-2-4-million-pre-seed-to-build-stablecoin-powered-cross-border-payment-infrastructure-for-africa/

## Across the graph
- Related: [[spiro-newtrails-270m-2026]], [[africa-startup-funding-h1-2026]]
- Entities: Crypto Web3, Fintech, Daya, Aptos, Nigeria, Africa

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