NALA appoints former TerraPay compliance chief Ashraf Aly as Global Head of Compliance & Risk. Fintech firm NALA has appointed Ashraf Aly as Global Head of Compliance & Risk to oversee its consumer and B2B operations. As the company scales its stablecoin-based settlement infrastructure, Rafiki, securing high-level regulatory expertise is a critical step in managing the complex cross-border flows now being transitioned by major banks and global enterprises. What was announced. Ashraf Aly joins NALA from TerraPay, where he served as Group Head of Compliance for a global cross-border payments network that settles with banks and wallets in 158 countries. His previous experience includes a tenure as Director of Compliance at Careem and four years at the FCA-regulated UK business lender iwoca, where he held the roles of Head of Compliance, MLRO, and DPO. At NALA, Aly is tasked with leading risk management for both the consumer-facing application and Rafiki, the company's B2B stablecoin payment infrastructure. Rafiki is currently utilized by major industry players, including MoneyGram and TransferGo, to facilitate cross-border transactions. The strategic hire comes at a time when an increasing number of banks and enterprises are transitioning their cross-border flows onto the Rafiki platform. This operational growth follows NALA's acquisition of a credit facility of up to $50 million from Liquidity earlier this year. Aly's role will be central to maintaining the integrity of these flows as the company integrates more deeply with traditional financial institutions and scales its blockchain-based settlement solutions across diverse geographies. The companies involved. NALA is a fintech company focused on building payment solutions for emerging markets. While it began with a consumer application designed to facilitate remittances, it has expanded significantly into the B2B space through Rafiki. Rafiki operates as a stablecoin-based infrastructure layer, designed to modernize the settlement process for global payments by reducing the friction typically associated with traditional banking rails. Supporting this growth is LIQUiDITY, a global capital provider that specializes in providing credit facilities to technology companies. Earlier this year, LIQUiDITY extended a $50 million facility to NALA, providing the necessary liquidity to scale its B2B operations. NALA's expansion into stablecoin settlement positions it as a bridge between traditional finance and blockchain-based assets, specifically targeting the inefficiencies in emerging-markets payments. The company maintains a presence in multiple jurisdictions, requiring a robust compliance framework to manage the diverse regulatory requirements of the countries where its partners operate. What FF News has reported before. FF News has tracked NALA's evolution from a regional player to a global infrastructure provider. In 2023, Ascento Capital reported when NALA receives PSP License from Bank of Tanzania, a key milestone for its African operations. This was followed by a significant capital boost in mid-2024, as NALA Raises $40m to Build Cross-Border Payments for Emerging Markets. More recently, its coverage has focused on the company's B2B pivot. In early 2026, Ascento Capital reported that Noah and NALA Launch Instant Stablecoin Settlement Network to Modernise $850bn Emerging-Markets Payments. This was followed by a major partnership announcement where MoneyGram and NALA Partner for Stablecoin Settlement Across Africa and Asia, cementing Rafiki's role in the global settlement landscape. What this means. This hire signals that the era of "move fast and break things" in stablecoin remittances is over. By recruiting a compliance lead with experience at both an FCA-regulated lender and a massive global network like TerraPay, NALA is acknowledging that its future depends on institutional trust rather than just technical speed. As stablecoins move from the fringes to the core of B2B settlement, the pressure is mounting on traditional correspondent banks to justify their fees and delays. However, the real challenge for the sector remains the fragmented global regulatory landscape; NALA's ability to navigate this will determine if Rafiki becomes a standard or remains a niche alternative. Featured speakers.

UK-Nigeria remittance rivals battle on rates and banking features. Africhange, LemFi and NALA are intensifying their rivalry along the UK-Nigeria remittance corridor as competition shifts beyond foreign exchange rates toward embedded banking services, savings products and deposit protection, according to a new market analysis published in October 2026. The corridor processes an estimated £2.8 billion annually, making it the largest cross-border payments channel between the UK and Africa and the third largest from the UK to any single country, according to data cited from the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford. The pricing battleground. Exchange rates remain the sharpest point of differentiation. An analysis of more than 37,000 matched price comparisons, drawn from aggregator platform BestRates and covering January 2025 to August 2026, found that Africhange delivered higher GBP-to-NGN payout quotes than LemFi in over 90% of instances, averaging an additional NGN 12.69 per pound sterling. The analysis cautions, however, that static historical comparisons capture only part of the picture, given that live FX rates shift throughout the trading day. Fee structures also vary: Africhange and LemFi both operate zero-transfer-fee models, while NALA uses a hybrid approach, charging a flat £0.99 fee on direct bank payouts and waiving fees on mobile-money channels. LemFi's competitive response rests on institutional scale rather than spot-rate aggression. Backed by a $53 million Series B completed in early 2025, the company reported crossing two million global users and processing approximately $1 billion in monthly transaction volume. NALA, meanwhile, serves more than one million users across 35 countries, with a pan-African coverage model targeting both consumer remittances and cross-border business payments. The super-app pivot. All three operators are pursuing product expansion that goes well beyond the transfer itself. Africhange has partnered with UK-licensed bank Griffin to offer customers dedicated GBP current accounts with individual sort codes and account numbers. The arrangement brings Financial Services Compensation Scheme deposit protection of up to £85,000, a regulatory feature that is uncommon among pure-play remittance providers and one that materially raises the trust threshold for customers considering holding balances rather than simply sending them. LemFi has added yield-bearing savings products and credit-monitoring tools to its app. NALA is rolling out its Global Account suite, which targets freelancers and small businesses with multi-currency holding and conversion across US dollars, sterling and local African currencies. David Ajala, chief executive of Africhange, said: "The UK-Nigeria payment highway is undergoing a fundamental transformation from a basic remittance corridor into an embedded banking battleground. The challenge is finding the right balance between price, reliability, scale and a broader range of financial services that gives customers a reason to stay." Market context and regulatory read-across. The strategic direction described here reflects a wider pattern across the African diaspora payments segment. Several well-capitalised operators, including WorldRemit and Wise, are also present on high-volume African corridors, and the competitive pressure from aggregator transparency tools has compressed FX margins industry-wide. From a regulatory standpoint, UK payment institutions serving diaspora senders operate under FCA oversight, and the Consumer Duty rules that came into force in 2023 place explicit obligations on firms to demonstrate fair value in their pricing. The FSCS partnership that Africhange has structured through Griffin is a notable differentiator in this context, as it effectively converts a remittance app into a deposit-taking relationship in the eyes of the customer, with the protection that implies. Rivals pursuing savings features without a banking licence or a licensed partner face a narrower product envelope under current FCA authorisation frameworks. The analysis suggests that, for the corridor's next phase, competitive advantage will rest less on who posts the sharpest daily rate and more on who captures the broader financial relationship of the UK-based Nigerian diaspora. AI level 1 of 5: written by Darlyn Ho; AI helped with tone, structure or wording; edited and signed off by Mark Walker, Editorial Director. What the levels mean