DeFi protocol frontend in Namibia

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 framework is in force rather than in progress: the Virtual Assets Act 10 of 2023 commenced on 25 July 2023, the Bank of Namibia gazetted seven sets of rules on 1 September 2023, and Government Notice 513 in Gazette 8197 sets six licence classes with minimum capital rising to N$2 700 000 for a virtual asset market place.

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.

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.

Outcome: To educate the public about the risks of unregulated investment schemes, including those masquerading as cryptocurrency opportunities, emphasizing that these schemes are not licensed or supervised by NAMFISA.

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 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.

Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) Namibia

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.

Bank of Namibia warnings resting on virtual assets being unregulated were superseded by the Virtual Assets Act 10 of 2023, which commenced on 25 July 2023, and by the seven sets of Bank of Namibia rules gazetted on 1 September 2023 in Government Gazettes 8196 to 8202; virtual assets nonetheless still hold no legal tender status in Namibia.

Entity Targeted: General public and unregulated entities dealing in crypto assets. No specific private entity was targeted for enforcement. Violation Type: N/A (as no specific enforcement action was taken against an entity). The BoN's actions focused on addressing the unregulated nature of virtual assets and the associated risks. Penalty Amount: N/A (no penalty issued).