Fintech & digital payments rules in Colombia (2026)

Law 1735 of 2014 created Sociedades Especializadas en Depósitos y Pagos Electrónicos (SEDPEs), a dedicated license for capturing electronic deposits and making payments/transfers, authorized and supervised by the SFC. They cannot grant credit and must hold customer funds in sight deposits at supervised entities or the central bank; authorized players include Movii, Coink, Dale!, Powwi, Ding, Global66 and others.

The Superintendencia Financiera de Colombia (SFC) authorizes, inspects and supervises financial institutions including SEDPEs and payment-system administrators, while Banco de la República operates and oversees core payment infrastructure.

Decree 1692 of 2020 (amending Decree 2555 of 2010) restructured low-value payment systems (SPBV), separating clearing/settlement from issuing and acquiring, opening the acquiring activity to credit institutions, SEDPEs and a new category of non-supervised acquirers subject to SFC registration.

Decree 1297 of 2022 introduced a voluntary open-finance framework (including payment initiation), with SFC External Circular 004 of 2024 defining API, security and architecture standards; Decree 0368 of 2026 made the Open Finance System mandatory for SFC-supervised entities.

Banco de la República's interoperable instant-payment system Bre-B entered operation on 6 October 2025 after a controlled rollout from 23 September, connecting banks, e-wallets and PSPs via a centralized alias directory (DICE) and settlement mechanism (MOL), governed by the public-private CIPI committee.

Buy-now-pay-later is growing rapidly but has no dedicated statute; the SFC has issued supervisory guidance rather than a specific licensing regime, so BNPL providers operate under general consumer-credit and financial-supervision rules.