TL;DR
- Tether and Shiga are expanding self-custodial financial products across Africa and the Gulf Cooperation Council using Tether’s Wallet Development Kit.
- The initiative covers USD₮, Bitcoin and XAU₮, while ENTA targets individuals and businesses and Pulse is designed for banks and fintechs.
- The partnership builds on Tether’s 2025 investment in Shiga and focuses on payments, treasury management and cross-border settlement.
Tether WDK is moving into a broader regional deployment through a new collaboration with Shiga, giving individuals, businesses and institutions access to financial products built around self-custody. The companies announced the initiative on September 28, 2026, with support for USD₮, Bitcoin and Tether Gold (XAU₮). Users can retain direct control of their assets instead of depending entirely on a centralized wallet provider.
Tether WDK Extends Self-Custody Across Africa And GCC
The rollout responds to practical payment challenges in markets where currency volatility, banking access and cross-border costs remain important concerns. World Bank data show that the average cost of sending remittances to Sub-Saharan Africa was 8.46% in the third quarter of 2025, compared with a 6.36% global average. That cost creates room for blockchain-based settlement networks and dollar-denominated digital assets to compete with traditional payment rails.
Shiga’s ENTA product will allow individuals, high-net-worth users and businesses to fund self-custodial wallets using local currency, U.S. dollars or Bitcoin. They can then hold and transfer USD₮, Bitcoin and XAU₮, creating a digital asset layer designed around savings and payments rather than trading alone.
Pulse Targets Banks And Payment Corridors
Shiga is also positioning Pulse as infrastructure for banks, fintech companies and other institutions. The platform is intended to support specific payment corridors, treasury activity and settlement flows, with deployments managed by Shiga or operated within a client’s own environment. This gives institutions greater control over keys, data and operational infrastructure.
The model builds on Tether’s strategic investment in Shiga in June 2025. At that time, Tether said the partnership would support blockchain-based financial infrastructure for African businesses, including USD₮ access, treasury management, foreign exchange and cross-border payments. The new WDK integration expands that relationship from investment and infrastructure support toward products that users and institutions can deploy directly.
WDK provides the wallet technology underneath ENTA and Pulse, while its open-source architecture allows developers to build self-custodial applications across supported blockchain networks. Tether has also continued expanding WDK, with recent updates adding modules for wallet interoperability, private transactions and additional chain support.
