Putting money into a South African savings account produces such dismal interest that, in most cases, it doesn’t even keep up with inflation. The problem is not specific to South Africa.

The whole point of bitcoin was to put finance into the hands of the people. Back in 2009, those who believed this was possible were considered unrealistic dreamers. Today, they are thought of as visionaries.

OVEX, the South African cryptocurrency exchange with the deepest liquidity of all exchanges in Africa, is at the forefront of turning those visions into reality. One of the ways it does this is by offering extremely high interest-earning accounts that can provide depositors with as much as 20% in annualised interest. This service has grown so popular that OVEX now manages assets close to R1-billion solely in those interest accounts.

How DeFi turned the traditional banking system on its head

The vision behind bitcoin is to create a completely decentralised and trustless monetary system. Ethereum’s distributed ledger, on the other hand, aims to become the foundation for open-ended decentralised software platforms.

These both run on transparent and immutable blockchains. Today there are a number of blockchains with similar use cases all supporting a burgeoning ecosystem built on smart contracts.

An example of one of the revolutionary ecosystems built on the blockchain are decentralised lending protocols. DeFi (decentralised finance) lending allows investors and lenders to issue loans or deposit fiat money for interest through a distributed and decentralised application system. By completely eliminating traditional financial intermediaries, such as banks, that normally issue debt, these decentralised protocols can offer financial services to people minus the hefty management fee. Digital asset service providers like OVEX are able to pass these savings on to the user. See for yourself here.

An entire financial ecosystem built on immutable smart contracts has given way to a plethora of low-risk, yield-generating strategies far beyond the money market.

Democratising finance

OVEX has a history of democratising finance and putting it into the hands of the people. It did this with its revolutionary Request for Quote (RFQ) tool that allows novice investors to simply buy bitcoin with zero fees without having to stare at, what can be, a confusing open order book.

And now OVEX is bringing the power of an otherwise-complicated ecosystem in DeFi to the everyday trader with its high-interest-earning accounts. These accounts support several stablecoins – which are cryptocurrencies tied to real-world assets like the US dollar to stabilise the price. These USD stablecoins are the perfect marriage between stability and yield for those seeking refuge from the crypto markets’ notorious volatility. Now OVEX even offers Africa’s first-ever fully audited stablecoin for the South African rand: $ZARP. Here you can earn yields up to 13%/annum.

These interest accounts have proved popular amongst asset managers and high-net-worth individuals, but they are also accessible to people of any means with approachable minimum deposit sizes.

OVEX storms a path forward in uncertain times

The South African exchange has gone from strength to strength since its founding in 2017. Its repeated successes are due in no small part to highly innovative strategies to bring cryptocurrency to everyone.

But the other reason for OVEX’s immense growth is simply the staggering depth of its liquidity. OVEX handles so much cryptocurrency volume on a daily basis that it is now able to offer a “trade now, pay later” credit line of R100-million to large-volume investors so they can lock in trades before funds are even settled. That same level of liquidity means that, for orders over US$1-million, OVEX prices are over 3% more competitive than local South African exchanges. In total, over R7.5-billion in transactions goes through the exchange every month, and a stunning R3-billion comes through from third parties who use OVEX’s API.

The same liquidity which gave OVEX a reputation for offering white-glove, concierge-style service to large investors, brokers and asset management firms is now empowering retail investors, too — they can trade crypto assets against ZAR as well as against other cryptos all with zero fees. They can then earn regardless of whether the market is bull or bear through high-interest-earning accounts without having to take huge investment risks.

Disclaimer
OVEX does not give any trading, market, investment or financial advice in connection with the services, through any channel or means, including the help desk and the over-the-counter (OTC) facility. You make use of OVEX services strictly on an executionary basis, each time instructing OVEX to execute your transactions.

OVEX is a juristic representative of OVEX FSP (Pty) Ltd, FSP number 50776. OVEX provides limited financial services on behalf of OVEX FSP (Pty) Ltd.