owizdom/cowrie

Cowrie: a cross-border payment network for Africa. NGN→KES settlement in seconds for under 1%, bridged through cUSDC. # Cowrie **A cross-border payment network for Africa.** ### Try it now | | | |---|---| | **Live app** | **cowrie-web-production.up.ra… | | **API** | cowrie-api-production.up.ra… | | **Interactive API docs** | cowrie-api-production.up.ra… | | **Public transparency page** | cowrie-web-production.up.ra… | Open **`/pay`**, create an account with any phone number and email — the verification code is shown on screen — then send a transfer and watch it settle in about thirty seconds. Nothing is seeded, so what you see is what you did. On Android, Chrome will offer to install CowriePay to your home screen. On iPhone, Safari installs it through **Share → Add to Home Screen**. Either way it opens full-screen with no browser chrome. The admin console at `/admin` signs in with `amara@cowrie.demo` / `cowrie-demo`. Cowrie settles payments between African currencies in seconds at under 1% in fees, using **cUSDC** — a USD-pegged stablecoin — as the neutral bridge between local on-ramps and off-ramps. The launch corridor is **Nigeria → Kenya**: naira leaves a Nigerian bank account, moves through cNGN and cUSDC on the Base network, and lands as Kenyan shillings in an M-Pesa wallet about thirty seconds later. If anything stalls, the sender is refunded within ten minutes. Every transfer either completes or comes back. --- ## Why this exists The most expensive currency for Africans to use is their own. The World Bank puts the cost of sending $200 within Sub-Saharan Africa at **7.4%**, against a global average of 6.2% and a UN SDG target of 3% (*Remittance Prices Worldwide*, Issue 53, Q1 2025). Settlement takes two to five days. 57% of African adults are unbanked. And the AfCFTA is projected to triple intra-African trade by 2035 — onto rails that cannot carry it. The reason is structural, and it is three things: 1. **There is no direct NGN/KES market.** Naira converts to dollars, dollars con …