Proudly South African crypto, since 2020
Cape Crypto is a fully licensed South African exchange on a mission to bring crypto to everyday South Africans — with the lowest trading fees in the country.
Our story
Cape Crypto was founded in July 2020 and launched on 5 November 2020. With over 5 years of operation and more than R1 billion in trading volume, we are a fully licensed Financial Services Provider (FSP) registered in South Africa.
Born from a belief that cryptocurrency can transform the financial landscape for everyday South Africans, Cape Crypto is proudly South African and built for South Africans. When you use Cape Crypto, you support a local exchange and company — we are based in Cape Town, and always will be.
We facilitate a marketplace for buyers and sellers of cryptocurrency. We also offer a simplified buying and selling experience for customers who just want to buy or sell without navigating the exchange, and customers can send and receive cryptocurrency as well.
Our founder & CEO
Leon Kowalski
Founder & CEO
Kowalski has a developer, technology, management and startup background going back many years. He founded his first company straight out of college in 2005 — an IT services company servicing SMEs, which he ran for three years. From there, he stepped into freelance software development which allowed him to explore different markets around the world.
While working in Sydney, Australia, Kowalski dedicated his full time to product management and development. He spent six years working at various startups across Sydney before returning to Cape Town. In 2018, Luno brought Kowalski onto the product management team to focus on multiple aspects of the customer-facing product.
His first exposure to Bitcoin was in 2012, and he has been actively involved in the cryptocurrency space ever since. His vision is to realise cryptocurrency's full potential for all South Africans.
Backed by Numeral
Cape Crypto is proudly backed by Numeral, who have taken a strategic stake in the company. Their investment strengthens our foundation and supports our mission to bring crypto to everyday South Africans.
Dave van Niekerk
Owner — Aluma & Numeral
Dave has more than 20 years of banking, microfinance, corporate and executive management experience. He is well known in the Pan African business space for founding MyBucks, a fintech company operating in 13 countries in Africa, Europe and Australia.
He was the founder and previous CEO of the company Blue Financial Services, a microlender operating in 14 countries with a turnover of R700 million and a loan book size of roughly 400 million USD in 2009.
He is an accomplished, visionary entrepreneur, being quoted in the South African Business Day as being “SA’s own Branson” (15 May 2008), with wide practical experience in strategic and operational management, change management, and financial management and control across all strategic and operational issues.
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