Fintech & payments regulation in Costa Rica (2026)

Costa Rica's Legislative Assembly passed Bill 22.837 in its second debate, amending the anti-money-laundering Law 7786 to formally bring Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) under SUGEF supervision, mandatory KYC, and AML/CFT obligations, the country's first binding crypto-sector law.

A Ministerio de Hacienda fiscal requirement took effect requiring businesses to itemize SINPE Móvil collections on their electronic invoices, integrating the country's dominant fast-payment channel into the formal tax-reporting infrastructure.

Bill 22.837 cleared its first debate in the Legislative Assembly with unanimous support, introducing a new Article 15 quáter to Law 7786 that would mandate VASP registration with SUGEF; the text was later remitted for a second first-debate vote to resolve procedural observations before final passage.

The Permanent Ordinary Committee on Economic Affairs gave unanimous approval to the Ley Marco Fintech, a standalone licensing and regulatory framework for fintech companies, filling the legal gap that had left non-bank payment and lending fintechs in a regulatory grey zone, and forwarding it to plenary.

The BCCR's Board of Directors promulgated a comprehensive revision of the Card Payment System Regulation, extending its scope to require payment gateways and aggregators to formally register with the BCCR for the first time, and tightening cross-border acquisition commission caps at 2.50%.

Costa Rica launched its Financial Innovation Center, a non-binding regulatory sandbox and consultation body attached to CONASSIF, where fintech startups can engage all four financial superintendencies for pre-launch guidance; the first such institution in Central America, backed by the Inter-American Development Bank.

Law 9831 was published in La Gaceta, delegating to the BCCR the power to set binding maximum interchange and merchant-acquisition fees; the BCCR subsequently capped interchange at 1.00% and acquisition at 2.50%, materially reducing the cost of card acceptance for Costa Rican merchants.

The National Council for Supervision of the Financial System (CONASSIF) and the BCCR jointly created a FinTech Working Group spanning all four financial superintendencies to develop a common regulatory roadmap; this body produced the agenda that led to the CIF and the eventual Fintech Framework Bill.

The BCCR launched SINPE Móvil, a 24/7 real-time P2P and B2C transfer service using mobile phone numbers as the only address; free for transactions up to ₡100,000 (~US$200), it became one of the world's most-adopted fast-payment systems with over 80% adult-population usage by 2025.

The BCCR launched SINPE (Sistema Nacional de Pagos Electrónicos) on April 17, 1997, connecting all Costa Rican financial institutions through a private network for interbank electronic transfers and check clearing; it formed the core infrastructure on which all subsequent digital payment services, including SINPE Móvil, were built.