Ray Youssef’s Leadership: Empowering the Global South Financially

Bitpapa, the innovative financial communication super app bridging individuals from the Global South to the world’s financial systems, proudly announces its official launch under the guidance of Ray Youssef as CEO. Youssef is dedicated to spearheading the startup’s ambitious mission to garner a billion daily active users of Bitcoin within the forthcoming seven years.

Established in 2024, Bitpapa emerged with the noble objective of empowering financial freedom within the Global South. The platform facilitates seamless money transfers, liberating users from the constraints and inefficiencies associated with traditional banking institutions. Its core philosophy revolves around the conviction that peer-to-peer interactions constitute the world’s only true free market, with Bitcoin standing as the new global financial infrastructure poised to elevate the people of Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. Bitpapa has witnessed significant traction in key markets such as Nigeria, Ghana, Cameroon, India, and the Philippines, amassing over 400,000 users worldwide and achieving profitability within just under four months of inception.

Key Features of the App:

• A marketplace facilitating Bitcoin and stable coin transactions among users from 190 countries, offering over 400 payment methods, including gift cards, mobile money, bank transfers, and other cryptocurrencies.
• A wallet serving as a secure store of value.
• A messenger serving as the primary platform for peer-to-peer trades.

Beyond its extensive array of product features, including an upcoming advanced wallet functionality enabling bill payment processing with top African vendors, Bitpapa remains steadfast in its commitment to enhancing user experience, particularly for customers in the Global South. This dedication entails streamlining the onboarding process with a simplified and seamless KYC process and fostering a secure trading environment with a swift and efficient localized dispute resolution mechanism.

Ray Youssef’s Leadership and Vision:

Ray Youssef’s appointment as CEO brings a wealth of experience and expertise across strategic planning, product innovation, growth hacking, and operations management. As a seasoned entrepreneur, Youssef offers invaluable insights garnered from navigating the challenges of the startup landscape. Prior to joining Bitpapa, he served as the CEO of Bitpapa, USA, INC., a company he founded and guided to unprecedented success.

Youssef is also instrumental in the establishment of Built with Bitcoin, a foundation committed to constructing 100 communities across Africa, aimed at improving the physical, mental, environmental, and financial well-being of underserved populations.

Expressing his enthusiasm for his new role as CEO of Bitpapa, Ray Youssef remarked, “It is a privilege to assume this position and immediately commence our efforts. For the past eight years, I have advocated for financial sovereignty in the Global South. Finally, I am delighted to fulfill the mission I embarked upon almost a decade ago. I firmly believe that Bitcoin will play a pivotal role in fostering the prosperity of our continent, and I am excited and honored to contribute to the company’s aspirations and growth. Our initial objective will be to establish an interoperable Pan-African clearing layer, elevating intra-African trade from single digits to levels commensurate with intra-European trade. Africa alone holds the potential to catapult Bitpapa into a trillion-dollar enterprise, and when we encompass the entire Global South, the possibilities are limitless.”

As a co-author of the CivKit whitepaper – a decentralized open-source protocol for Civilization 2.0 – Youssef underscores his commitment to financial inclusion. He envisions Bitcoin as a catalyst for eradicating poverty and affording the Global South a rightful place in the global financial discourse, fostering increased trade and prosperity. Bitpapa will be the inaugural company to leverage CivKit, sharing its liquidity and welcoming new competitors to collaboratively build a global free market.

Youssef concluded, “Despite the advent of the internet, mobile phones, and a wave of disruptive startups, genuine disruption in the realm of money remains elusive. At Bitpapa, we believe that completing Bitcoin is the solution. New financial tools are unlocking unprecedented, borderless opportunities, empowering individuals in unprecedented ways. The journey ahead is filled with boundless potential as we continue to empower individuals and nations alike.