Nigeria seeks to counter financial fraud scourge
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This article is the latest part of the FT’s Financial Literacy and Inclusion Campaign
Solar systems engineer John was sceptical of the newfangled cryptocurrency trading platform promising 10 per cent returns in 30 days. But a recent family bereavement and a slowdown in work installing solar panels in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital, meant John was vulnerable to the lure of a platform he was not entirely convinced by.
John, whose name has been changed at his request, was introduced to the digital asset trading platform Crypto Bridge Exchange or CBEX last December through a friend who had invested their own money. Convinced by an authentic-looking certificate of registration with Nigeria’s Corporate Affairs Commission, the 38-year-old took the plunge and invested the entirety of his savings N900,000 (about $600) in the hopes of making healthy returns.
John was able to make a withdrawal after trading on CBEX for the first month. But withdrawals soon stopped around the same time CBEX began giving its customers bonuses of about $100. Since April, John and other CBEX users, estimated to be in the thousands, have been unable to withdraw a combined total exceeding $800mn from the trading platform, according to local media reports.
“The truth is that I gave up once I noticed they stopped withdrawals,” said John, who has about $1,000 stuck with CBEX. “I’ve read many stories about other trades like this and whenever there’s a problem, you just know that is the end of it.”
Financial literacy charity
An untold number of Nigerians have fallen for Ponzi schemes over the years as unscrupulous criminals take advantage of a desperate economic situation that has forced many to seek alternative ways of making ends meet. Nigeria’s economy is experiencing high levels of inflation and GDP per capita has fallen to $806.84 in 2025, down from $2,730 a decade ago.
Now authorities in Nigeria are looking to fight back against a scourge of frauds that have proliferated and robbed Nigerians of millions of dollars. The Nigeria Deposit Insurance Company said in 2022 that more than $600mn had been lost to scams since the turn of the century, a number that would have risen in the intervening period.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Nigeria’s anti-corruption agency, told the Financial Times that it had this year launched a nationwide campaign on social and traditional media warning people about the dangers of investment schemes.
“Don’t get caught in the trap,” read one EFCC post on social media site X. “Beware of Ponzi schemes and invest wisely . . . if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.” The agency has also leaned into religious lessons in its messaging, citing biblical and Quranic teachings against greed as part of a strategy to reach people in a deeply religious country where Christians and Muslims are almost equally split 50-50.
To bolster their anti-fraud efforts with a “legal angle”, the EFCC and its partner agencies are banking on an Investment and Security Act signed into law in March by Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu.
“People cannot just go into online investment or trading without having the necessary prerequisite registration in Nigeria,” the agency said. “The implication of that is it will be easier to monitor whatever investment offer is being given to the public.”
“People fall prey because they don’t understand fundamental principles of investing, particularly returns on investments and what is too good to be true,” said Grace Saba, regional co-ordinator for Aflatoun International, a global charity helping children gain social and financial literacy skills.
“Nigeria has strategies and policies [for financial literacy] that are good on paper,” Saba said. “But implementation is the missing thing. There also has to be budgetary allocation to help with implementation.”
In the wake of the CBEX scandal, the Securities and Exchange Commission, which regulates Nigeria’s capital markets, urged potential investors to “verify the registration status of investment platforms” via its dedicated portal. CBEX did not have the appropriate registration and was registered under a different name — ST Technologies — as an anti-money laundering consultancy, according to the EFCC.
Although the agency said it had charged suspects and recovered an undisclosed amount in connection with the CBEX case, victims of the scheme appear to have little faith in being made whole or in EFCC’s handling of the saga.
A 38-year-old fellow investor who introduced John to CBEX said they felt the EFCC’s comments in the aftermath of the company’s collapse was tantamount to victim blaming and they had lost hope of being able to recoup their $2,000 investment.
“EFCC should do better due diligence on these companies since they are the ones fighting crime,” said the person, who requested anonymity as a condition for talking to the FT. “How it possible that just anybody can register [a business]? At the end of the day, it seems they’re not fighting crime then.”
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The person added the experience has left them wary of any investment schemes outside of “traditional buying and selling” of physical goods.
John, the solar systems engineer, said the CBEX saga has left him broke but added that he had learned a valuable lesson. “It’s one of those things that happens in Nigeria, I’m not even dreaming of getting my money back . . . this cannot happen again. This experience has made me very vigilant and careful about details.”
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