Luno CEO James Lanigan Warns $33T Stablecoin Boom Could Bypass South Africa

Lanigan Warns of Competitiveness Risk

South Africa risks severely undermining its planetary economical competitiveness if upcoming fiscal regulations artifact the usage of stablecoins, according to James Lanigan, main enforcement serviceman of Luno.

Lanigan warned that the recently projected Capital Flow Management Regulations from the National Treasury and the South African Reserve Bank, oregon SARB, could inadvertently fastener South African businesses retired of modern integer outgo systems, limiting important superior inflows into the country.

The informing comes arsenic the nationalist remark deadline for the draught Capital Flow Management Regulations draws near. Initially published successful precocious April, the sweeping draught regulations are an effort to overhaul the country’s decades-old speech power regime. However, the draught rules triggered an contiguous question of industry backlash, forcing regulators to widen the archetypal nationalist remark deadline from May 18 to June 30, 2026.

Critics initially sounded alarms implicit terrible enforcement provisions, including imaginable situation sentences, dense fines, and fears that the authorities could aggressively prehend assets oregon restrict crypto ownership thresholds, forcing investors to liquidate holdings into rands.

While the National Treasury and SARB issued a joint statement successful May attempting to assuage nationalist panic—clarifying that they person nary volition of criminalizing plus ownership oregon applying rules retrospectively—Lanigan highlights a overmuch deeper systemic menace to the B2B fiscal sector: the choking of stablecoins.

“ Stablecoins are already settling much worth annually than Visa and Mastercard combined,” Lanigan said, pointing to Bloomberg information showing that stablecoins accounted for a staggering $33 trillion successful payments and blockchain transfers successful 2025—nearly treble Visa’s $17 trillion. “This is driven by the usage of crypto by businesses, successful summation to mean investors.”

The Scale of Stablecoin Growth

According to Lanigan, the existent wording of the regulations could prohibit section enterprises from utilizing stablecoins to execute cross-border payments oregon repatriate funds backmost home. This would woody a terrible stroke to South African multinationals operating crossed the continent, wherever terrible shortages of carnal US dollars marque moving wealth and repatriating profits done accepted banking networks notoriously dilatory and expensive.

“Local stablecoins are captious infrastructure to enactment home payments and treasury flows, portion dollar stablecoins supply a accelerated span to planetary commerce and cross-border settlement,” Lanigan explained. “Together, they trim friction, little costs, and marque wealth determination much efficiently astatine location and abroad.”

The superior vexation for manufacture stakeholders is that regulators are asking for feedback connected rules without providing the existent operational context.

The National Treasury and SARB person acknowledged that the nonstop definitions of what constitutes a “cross-border crypto transaction” volition lone beryllium revealed successful a subsequent, yet-to-be-released draught instructional manual. Until that model drops, businesses are being forced to remark connected bare regulations that permission them successful a ineligible grey zone.

Currently, the lack of standardized banking reporting codes for stablecoin transactions leaves section firms hesitant to follow them, fearing noncompliance. Lanigan notes that businesses attack Luno astir regular looking for stablecoin solutions to navigate the continent’s currency liquidity crisis. By leaving these rules ambiguous oregon overly restrictive, the authorities is actively reducing outgo flows into South Africa, harming section businesses, and shrinking the nationalist taxation base.

As planetary fiscal titans similar Blackrock, JPMorgan Chase, Visa and Société Générale rapidly migrate infrastructure on-chain, South Africa stands astatine a regulatory crossroads.

“It is indispensable that South Africa moves, done thoughtful revision of the draught Capital Flow Management Regulations, to unlock the economical maturation imaginable of stablecoins,” Lanigan urged. “Without the integration of stablecoins into the section fiscal mainstream, South Africa volition bounds its competitiveness successful the modern economical system.”