Fintech & digital payments rules in Sudan (2026)

The Central Bank of Sudan holds oversight of e-money licensing and provision, the retail payment system and agent operations, acting as the single authority licensing and supervising payment/e-money providers.

Until late 2020, mobile money had to run on the centralized platform of the state-owned Electronic Banking Services (EBS), the only permitted e-money issuer. Revised e-money regulations opened issuance to other licensed providers, though new models are still maturing.

CBoS issued a directive allowing mobile network operators and fintechs to establish payment subsidiaries supervised and licensed by CBoS; MTN was an early licensee. However, implementing regulations have not yet been issued and the licensing process lacks clarity and transparency.

Fintechs have raised concerns that the capital requirements for a payment service licence may be set too high for start-up businesses, a barrier compounded by the unsettled implementing rules.

All financial service providers connect through the EBS national switch, which also runs the clearing house, national ATM switch and SWIFT gateway via a single API — providing interoperability but a single point of failure.

When EBS lost power early in the April 2023 conflict, much of the mobile money ecosystem went down; Bank of Khartoum's Bankak app became the primary functioning rail, handling tens of millions of wartime transactions amid an ~85% rise in app activations.