CrissCross secures Circle Ventures capital through Stitch
CrissCross secures undisclosed Circle Ventures capital through Stitch Group, aiming to scale collections, payouts and FX across more than 30 African markets.
Circle Ventures has put capital into CrissCross through parent Stitch Group, and where that money sits is the payments story. Having tracked Circle's payout build-out, this cheque reads as a bid for the local collection, payout and foreign-exchange layer that lands funds in African bank accounts and mobile wallets, rather than a fresh argument about stablecoin rules. CrissCross said on October 26, 2026 that Circle Ventures, the corporate venture arm of Circle Internet Group, Inc., invested via Stitch Group to scale stablecoin-powered infrastructure across more than 30 African markets. CrissCross published the investor, the parent and the product plan, and left the cheque size off the announcement.
The pattern is already in Circle's book. Industry Spread has covered Circle's Tazapay purchase, a payout-network deal aimed at a much wider set of markets, and Flutterwave's own blog says the Nigerian processor has taken a Circle Ventures investment while adding USD Coin (USDC) settlement for merchants who collect locally. CrissCross is the narrower instrument, one Application Programming Interface (API) for collections, automated payouts, treasury and real-time foreign exchange, with blockchain settlement handed to fiat at a bank account or mobile wallet.
What the company says the money is for
James Cope, general manager of CrissCross, put the commercial claim on the announcement itself. “Africa's cross-border payments market is massive, complex, and underserved. Circle Ventures' investment validates what we've been building: infrastructure that can handle that complexity at scale.” Brian Schultz, vice president of corporate development and ventures at Circle, answered from the investor side. “We're excited to support CrissCross as they bring stablecoin-powered payments infrastructure to scale across African markets — some of the most complex and underserved corridors in the world.” The company says the capital will keep payments across Africa faster, simpler and more reliable. TechCabal, which identified Circle as the issuer of USDC, reported wider local connections and liquidity, more enterprise stablecoin settlement and a larger support team, and said Lex Campbell and Byron Coetsee founded CrissCross before an early acquisition by Stitch.
The rail underneath the cheque
On that announcement CrissCross says it operates in more than 30 markets, supports more than 20 currencies and runs at 99.99% uptime for multinational enterprises, financial institutions and platforms. Its about page adds a South African headquarters, Canadian operations and a Money Services Business registration with FINTRAC under number C100000765, which a payout client needs because blockchain settlement and fiat delivery can sit in different entities. The page also carries the company's own customer notes from Zepz, on African foreign-exchange corridors, and from EasyEquities, on a Kenya launch through the API.
Who else is on the corridor
Flutterwave's blog already frames USDC settlement as local collection with stablecoin settlement on an existing processor. CrissCross starts from the corridor and treats stablecoin settlement as one path inside collections, payouts and foreign exchange. On October 8, 2026 the company said it had partnered with Velocity, a stablecoin treasury platform, to connect institutional on-chain liquidity with those local rails. Olann Kerrison, chief network officer at Velocity, said the opportunity is “to connect global liquidity much more effectively with the infrastructure businesses rely on in each market.” On that note CrissCross argued that an on-chain hop loses its speed if the final leg drops into correspondent banking, and put idle pre-funded balances at around 10% for enterprise clients.
Why the parent vehicle matters
Routing the investment through Stitch Group keeps a strategic shareholder in the payments group and keeps a public valuation off the page, so the missing round size is a governance question for Stitch. The same split, a global name plus a specialist network that finishes the payout, is what the Thunes arrangement on Xpedite Remit describes. Other Africa payments companies are raising against that demand, including Moment's Series A after the MultiChoice spin-out.
What a buyer should watch next
If Circle wants a dollar stablecoin to move value between markets, someone still has to turn that balance into local currency in a bank account or a mobile wallet, under a registration a treasurer can name. CrissCross already claims that conversion layer, the uptime figure and the market count, and the Velocity partnership is its attempt to attach institutional liquidity. The next evidence will be corridor coverage, settlement times clients can audit, and whether enterprise treasury routes through the API, well before a follow-on round prints a number. A payments chief should treat CrissCross as corridor infrastructure with a new shareholder in the parent, and should ask Stitch which governance rights arrived with the undisclosed sum.
This report is for industry information only and is not investment, legal or regulatory advice.
Reporting by Rick Steves. Filed 1 November 2026, 17:16 GMT.
Senior Reporter, Regulation and Fintech
Rick Steves has seen business and economics through many lenses. He joined the financial services industry in 2009, and has been a financial journalist since 2011.
