Ziina becomes the first homegrown UAE fintech with Central Bank licences across payments, stored value and exchange

Ziina has secured a Retail Payment Services Category III licence and authorisation for Exchange Business Category IV activities, under its existing Stored Value Facility licence, from the Central Bank of the UAE. It is the first homegrown UAE fintech to hold permissions spanning all three activities.

The approvals complete Ziina's latest phase of licensing and give it an independent regulatory perimeter. The company says it can now offer consumer deposits, merchant acceptance, domestic real-time settlement and cross-border transfers in one application.

Co-founder and CEO Faisal Toukan said the licences give Ziina the framework to build faster, with the ambition of extending what it builds in the UAE across the Arab world.