Crypto-funded debit card in Namibia

Namibia's AML/CFT framework rests on the Financial Intelligence Act 13 of 2012, which establishes the Financial Intelligence Centre and imposes registration, customer due diligence, record-keeping and reporting duties on accountable and reporting institutions; its amending instruments are the Prevention and Combating of Terrorist and Proliferation Activities Act 4 of 2014, Government Notice 339 of 2019 amending Schedule 1, the Abolition of Payment by Cheque Act 16 of 2022 and the Financial Intelligence Amendment Act 6 of 2023, effective 21 July 2023. No Financial Intelligence Amendment Act of 2017 exists, Act 2 of 2017 being the Access to Biological and Genetic Resources and Associated Traditional Knowledge Act.

Namibia's Financial Intelligence Regulations were made under section 73(2) of the Financial Intelligence Act 13 of 2012 and published as Government Notice 3 of 2015 in Government Gazette 5658, in operation from 28 January 2015, and were amended by Government Notice 48 of 2021 and Government Notice 271 of 2023; no Financial Intelligence Regulations of 2017 were made. The Regulations prescribe the identification particulars for natural persons in regulation 6 and for companies and trusts in regulations 7 and 10, enhanced due diligence in regulation 15(3), a five-year record retention period in regulation 18(5), cash-reporting thresholds of N$99 999.99 and N$24 999.99 in regulation 23 and the originator and beneficiary particulars for reportable transfers in regulation 32.

Evidence fact na.aml.identification-and-verification-of-customers not found (may have been renamed).

Natural Persons: Obtain full name, date of birth, residential address, nationality, identification number (e.g., national ID, passport). Verify identity using reliable, independent source documents, data, or information (e.g., government-issued ID, utility bills).

Legal Persons/Arrangements (Companies, Trusts): Obtain name, legal form, proof of existence, powers that regulate and bind the legal person/arrangement, and the names of relevant persons holding senior management positions.

Beneficial Ownership: Identify and verify the identity of the beneficial owner(s) of the customer, ensuring that VASPs understand the ownership and control structure of the customer. This involves identifying the natural person(s) who ultimately own or control the customer, and/or on whose behalf a transaction is being conducted.

Purpose and Nature of Business Relationship: Understand the purpose and intended nature of the business relationship or occasional transaction.

Ongoing Monitoring: Conduct ongoing due diligence on the business relationship and scrutiny of transactions undertaken throughout the course of that relationship to ensure that the transactions are consistent with the VASP's knowledge of the customer, their business, and risk profile, including, where necessary, the source of funds.

Enhanced Due Diligence (EDD): Apply EDD in higher-risk situations, which typically include:

Politically Exposed Persons (PEPs).

Customers from high-risk geographic areas (as identified by FATF or FIC).

Complex, unusually large transactions, or unusual patterns of transactions that have no apparent economic or lawful purpose.

Relationships with shell companies.

Transactions involving new technologies or products that favor anonymity.

Namibia already applies a virtual-asset travel rule: section 8.4 of Financial Intelligence Centre Guidance Note 11 of 2023, issued 30 June 2023 and effective 3 July 2023, requires a virtual asset service provider to obtain and transmit the originator's name, account number or unique transaction reference and address, identity number, customer identification number or date and place of birth, together with the beneficiary's name and account number or unique transaction reference, immediately and simultaneously with the transfer, for all virtual asset transfers regardless of amount, the EUR 1 000 de minimis having been dropped. A VASP transferring to an unhosted wallet must obtain the equivalent information from its own customer.

Namibia sets no monetary threshold for suspicious transaction reporting: section 33 of the Financial Intelligence Act 13 of 2012 requires an accountable or reporting institution that knows, ought reasonably to have known or suspects that it has received or is about to receive the proceeds of unlawful activities, or has been or is about to be used for money laundering, to report to the Financial Intelligence Centre irrespective of the size of the transaction, and the duty bites on transactions that are about to be concluded as well as completed ones. The threshold-based duties are the separate cash transaction reports under section 32, prescribed at N$99 999.99 by regulation 23(1) with a lower N$24 999.99 figure for banking institutions in regulation 23(2), and the electronic transfer reports under section 34.

Namibia prohibits tipping-off: under section 33(3) of the Financial Intelligence Act 13 of 2012 an accountable or reporting institution or business that has made or is to make a suspicious transaction report may not disclose that fact, or any information about the contents of the report, to any other person save in the exercise of powers under the Act, for the administration of the Act or under an order of court, and section 46 of the Act creates the tipping-off offence.

Customer Identification Records: Copies of all documents used for customer identification and verification (e.g., ID cards, passports, utility bills, company registration documents).

Transaction Records: Details of all transactions conducted by the VASP, including amounts, types of virtual assets, dates, sender and recipient information, and any associated messages. This includes both successful and attempted transactions.

Business Relationship Records: Records pertaining to the establishment and duration of business relationships.

Analysis and Decision Records: Records of any internal analysis undertaken regarding suspicious activity, and decisions made regarding whether or not to file an STR.

STRs Submitted: Copies of all suspicious transaction reports filed with the FIC.

Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) Namibia

Stablecoins have no legal tender status in Namibia: the Bank of Namibia's Revised Position on Virtual Assets and Virtual Asset Service Providers of August 2022 states that virtual assets remain without legal tender status and that the Bank does not recognise their use and acceptance as legal tender or as electronic money, and the Bank's Virtual Assets Act infographic states that virtual currencies do not enjoy legal tender status on par with the Namibia Dollar.

The Bank of Namibia has issued no statement that stablecoins may qualify as electronic money, and its Revised Position of August 2022 states the opposite, that the Bank does not recognise virtual assets as electronic money in Namibia. Determination PSD-3 confines electronic money to monetary value issued on receipt of legal tender, denominated in Namibia Dollar and redeemable on demand for cash in Namibia Dollar, and it was made under section 45 of the Payment System Management Act, 2023 (Act No. 14 of 2023) rather than the 2003 Act.

The Financial Institutions and Markets Act, 2021 (Act No. 2 of 2021), gazetted as Government Notice 207 in Government Gazette 7645 of 1 October 2021 and administered by NAMFISA, carries no virtual-asset, crypto, stablecoin or electronic-money provision, and section 1 of the Virtual Assets Act, 2023 excludes securities and other financial assets regulated under Namibian securities or financial assets law from the definition of a virtual asset.

Namibia's payment system and electronic money regime rests on the Payment System Management Act, 2023 (Act No. 14 of 2023); the Bank of Namibia issued Determination PSD-3 on the Issuing of Electronic Money in Namibia under section 45 of that Act on 15 September 2024, effective 27 March 2025, and PSD-3 defines electronic money as monetary value stored electronically, issued on receipt of an equivalent amount of legal tender, accepted by persons other than the issuer and redeemable on demand for cash in Namibia Dollar.

The Financial Institutions and Markets Act, 2021 is Act No. 2 of 2021, published as Government Notice 207 in Government Gazette 7645 of 1 October 2021, administered by NAMFISA, and it consolidates and harmonises the laws regulating financial institutions, financial intermediaries and financial markets in Namibia while carrying no virtual-asset, crypto, stablecoin or electronic-money provision.

If Classified as E-money: If a stablecoin is classified as e-money, it would likely be subject to the reserve and safeguarding requirements applicable to licensed e-money issuers under the Payment System Management Act, 2003. These typically involve holding equivalent fiat currency reserves in segregated accounts to ensure 1:1 backing and liquidity.

Issuing electronic money in Namibia requires a person to be licensed or authorised as a payment service provider by the Bank of Namibia under paragraph 8.1 of Determination PSD-3, made under section 45 of the Payment System Management Act, 2023 (Act No. 14 of 2023) and effective 27 March 2025; stablecoins fall outside that determination because the Bank does not recognise virtual assets as electronic money.

The Financial Institutions and Markets Act, 2021 (Act No. 2 of 2021) carries no virtual-asset, crypto or stablecoin provision, so Namibian securities law creates no stablecoin licence; a stablecoin that is not a security regulated under Namibian securities or financial assets law falls within the section 1 virtual-asset definition of the Virtual Assets Act, 2023 and is licensed by the Bank of Namibia in one of the six Schedule 1 classes.

Virtual asset service provider licensing in Namibia has been in force since the Virtual Assets Act, 2023 commenced on 25 July 2023, with six licence classes in Schedule 1 and capital floors set by Government Notice 513 of 1 September 2023; the Bank of Namibia granted provisional six-month authorisations to Mindex Virtual Asset Exchange (Pty) Ltd and Landifa Bitcoin Trade CC on 13 January 2025, during which those entities were not allowed to conduct any business or engage with persons in Namibia.

The Bank of Namibia's virtual-asset rulebook was completed in 2023 rather than pending: seven rules made under the Virtual Assets Act, 2023 were gazetted on 1 September 2023 in Government Gazettes 8196 to 8202 as Government Notices 512 to 518, covering advertising, capital and other financial requirements, risk management, custody of client assets, cyber security, statutory returns and client disclosure, and none of them imposes a reserve requirement on any stablecoin issuer.

The Bank of Namibia is the Regulatory Authority designated under section 5(1) of the Virtual Assets Act 10 of 2023, makes the rules that govern virtual asset service providers, and grants their authorisations, while NAMFISA holds no virtual-asset licensing or supervisory role.

The Bank of Namibia's comprehensive virtual-asset paper is the Revised Position on Virtual Assets and Virtual Asset Service Providers dated August 2022, and no Bank of Namibia virtual-asset release of 15 June 2022 was located on the Bank's own site.

The Bank of Namibia's August 2022 revised position, which described virtual assets as under-regulated and denied them legal tender or electronic money status, was overtaken by the Virtual Assets Act 10 of 2023 and by the Bank's rules of 1 September 2023, under which a virtual asset service provider must hold a Bank of Namibia licence and register with the Financial Intelligence Centre as an accountable institution.

Namibia's virtual-asset regulator is the Bank of Namibia, designated as the Regulatory Authority under section 5(1) of the Virtual Assets Act, 2023 (Act No. 10 of 2023) and named as the maker of all seven rules gazetted on 1 September 2023; NAMFISA has no virtual-asset licensing or supervisory function, and AML/CFT supervision of virtual asset service providers rests with the Financial Intelligence Centre under the Financial Intelligence Act 13 of 2012.

The Bank of Namibia states that virtual currencies do not enjoy legal tender status on par with the Namibia Dollar, a position it has held since its 2017 position paper and maintained after the Virtual Assets Act 10 of 2023 became operational on 25 July 2023.

Supply of Cryptocurrencies: Given the lack of specific guidance, it is likely that the supply of cryptocurrencies themselves (e.g., buying or selling crypto for fiat, or exchanging one crypto for another) would generally be exempt from VAT, similar to other financial services. This aligns with common international interpretations (e.g., EU VAT rules, which many African countries often look to).

Namibia's individual income tax scale under the Income Tax Act 24 of 1981 leaves the first N$100 000 of taxable income untaxed, starts at 18% above N$100 000 and reaches 37% only on taxable income exceeding N$1 550 000, where the tax is N$429 000 plus 37% of the excess; the N$1 500 000 top threshold belongs to the pre-2024 bracket table.

A Namibian company's disposal of virtual assets attracts no capital gains tax, because Namibia has no CGT and section 1 of the Income Tax Act 24 of 1981 keeps receipts of a capital nature out of gross income; a company gain becomes taxable only where the asset was held on revenue account or as trading stock, and the only targeted charges on capital-type disposals are paragraphs (o) and (q) of the gross-income definition, which cover mineral and petroleum licences.