By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Zimbabwe’s government on Friday announced that it will bring the largely informal cryptocurrency market under a regulatory oversight, which will require operators to formalise their registration and pay annual dues.
Businesses involved in buying, selling, transferring or safeguarding virtual assets must register each year with the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), an anti-money laundering agency under the supervision of the central bank, under new guidelines issued by Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube.
Authorities have fixed registration cost at $500 per year, and running a crypto business without it is considered an offence.
The regulation is seen as Zimbabwe’s first bold move to galvanise the potentials of the sector with a history of operating without a legal framework, largely underground.
The government had in 2018 barred financial institutions from trading cryptocurrency, pushing traders onto peer-to-peer platforms and social media.
Hyperinflation in the late 2000s wiped out savings and pensions, while repeated currency changes eroded trust in the banking system, driving demand for Bitcoin and other digital currencies alternative stores of value and means of transfer outside the formal system.
Remittances have fuelled adoption, with banks being the most expensive transfer channel, according to the World Bank’s Remittance Prices Worldwide report.
Zimbabwe’s move comes amid a broader global push to regulate cryptocurrencies following a series of high-profile exchange failures, fraud cases and concerns over money laundering.
It joins a growing number of African countries, including South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya and Mauritius, that have moved to regulate digital assets as it becomes a popular means of exchange.
According to the Chainalysis 2025 Global Crypto Adoption Index, Sub-Saharan Africa received more than $205 billion in on-chain value, the total dollar value of cryptocurrency transactions recorded on blockchains – between July 2024 and June 2025, a 52% year-on-year increase.
“This is a welcome development … It’s also good for traders that they don’t have to operate underground,” Reuters quoted a Harare-based crypto trade, Jeffrey Mutambiranwa, as saying.
