Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal opens crypto channel for Nepal flood fund

Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal kick-started a stablecoin donation campaign to contribute to the Disaster Relief Fund launched by Nepal’s Prime Minister. The program gives donors all over the world a direct on-chain route to assist the government’s recovery effort after an August 26 glacier collapse led to the death of over 1,250 people.

Nailwal made the announcement in an X post on September 4, claiming stablecoins as the best tool to use when aid has to be disbursed quickly.

At the time of writing, the website, nepalrelief.org, had raised $168,176 in total.

How the money gets to Kathmandu

Donations will not be deposited directly into a government wallet. Instead, they will be received on-chain and converted to USDC before being pooled at a public relief wallet on Ethereum or Polygon.

The next and final step will be to send the funds to Nepal’s official government fund. Scott DeLisi will lead Engage Nepal in collecting and accounting for the funds. Engage Nepal is a US-registered 501(c)(3), and DeLisi is a former US Ambassador to Nepal.

Polygon is not alone in this initiative. Open Money Stack will be in charge of bridging, routing, and conversion, while Cross River Bank ensures that fiat is moved to Nepal, and Coinme will supply payment infrastructure and crypto cash.

The campaign has received a pledge of $100,000 from Blockchain For Impact.

There are two ways to show support. Donors can make anonymous donations with any token on any chain, or donors based in the US can use Coinme to verify their identity to ensure the donation is next to their name.

Those who would rather avoid the interface can make use of the single USDC address published on the site; it works on both Ethereum and Polygon.

What the flood destroyed

The extent of the destruction by the flood is still being tallied. On August 26, a glacier above the Trishuli River gave way, causing ice, mud, and rock to fall about 80 kilometers down the valley through Nuwakot, Dhading, and Rasuwa.

With seven districts affected, there are 41 bridges destroyed, 42 kilometers of road severely damaged, and six hydropower plants lost.

The United Nations estimates a higher number of casualties. A UN statement on September 4, 2026, said the glacier collapse blocked the Nepal-Tibet border, killing over 1,250 individuals, with thousands missing.

The UN puts the estimated number of people affected at 84,270 or 19,284 households, and aims to raise $49.6 million in cash to support those affected.

There have been other crypto responses to the disaster

Nailwal’s fund is not the first crypto-sector commitment to the disaster in Nepal. Ripple made a pledge of $300,000 to assist relief groups in the region. It didn’t say whether it will be paying in XRP, fiat, or its RLUSD stablecoin.

The Solana Foundation and NFT marketplace Mallow put nine advertising slots up for auction and raised $166,946.50 in USDC, and Mallow routed the sum to Engage Nepal to be delivered into the same government fund.

This is not a first in the crypto space. Crypto donations in 2024 surpassed the $1 billion mark in 2024 and became the go-to for emergency aid after the earthquake that occurred in Myanmar and Thailand in March 2025.

Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao also donated 1,000 BNB, about $600,000, to the efforts in Myanmar and Thailand. Blockchain has a lot of supporters due to its reputation for being a faster alternative when banking infrastructure fails.

However, Nailwal is yet to release a schedule for converting the pooled crypto, nor has he mentioned when each batch will appear in the government fund. The final step is still dependent on conversion services and conventional banks.

Every deposit, conversion, and outgoing batch will be easily verifiable on-chain.

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