Ziina, the UAE’s homegrown consumer and business financial platform, has secured its Retail Payment Services Category III license and authorization to conduct Exchange Business Category IV activities under its existing Stored Value Facility license from the Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE), becoming the first homegrown UAE fintech company to hold regulatory authorizations spanning all three activities.
The approvals mark the completion of Ziina’s latest phase of regulatory licensing with the CBUAE and represent a significant milestone in the company’s growth. Together, these licenses give Ziina the regulatory foundation to expand the range of financial services it offers consumers and merchants through one platform, from receiving and holding money to spending, domestic payments and international transfers.
Ziina first received its Stored Value Facility license in 2024, authorizing the company to launch its digital wallet. The newly awarded Retail Payment Services Category III license significantly expands its regulated capabilities, covering merchant acquiring, payment aggregation, and domestic fund transfers. The license provides full regulatory authorisation for Ziina’s merchant acceptance products, including payment links, QR payments, Tap to Pay and its online payment gateway.
In August 2026, the CBUAE also authorized Ziina to conduct Exchange Business Category IV activities under its existing Stored Value Facility license, originally granted in June 2024. This additional authorization expands Ziina’s regulated capabilities to include international money transfers through digital channels, including directly through the Ziina app.
Faisal Toukan, Co-Founder and CEO at Ziina said:
“We’re thankful for the continued support of the Central Bank of the UAE. These licenses give us the regulatory framework to build faster and go further. When we launched Ziina in the UAE, we believed that we could build the next generation of financial products from this market, for the region. That conviction has only grown. Today, people use different apps and providers for different parts of their financial lives. We want to bring more financial services into one platform, from spending and holding money to sending it abroad. When more of your financial life is in one place, you have more control over your money. Our ambition is to take what we build here to enable financial freedom across the Arab world.”
The milestone comes as Ziina reaches scale. The company now serves more than 500,000 customers annually, processes more than $1.5 billion in annualised payment volume and is used by one in 10 UAE SMEs. The wider UAE market is also growing at significant scale. CBUAE’s Annual Report 2025 shows that retail transfers processed through the UAE Funds Transfer System reached AED 9.9 trillion across 114.9 million transactions in 2025, with transaction value up 19.9% and transaction volume up 17.8% year on year. The figures point to a large and increasingly active market for digital financial services in the UAE.
Ziina is investing in the products, technology and infrastructure to bring more financial services onto one platform, starting in the UAE and extending across the Arab world.
