FSCA-licensed crypto exchanges in South Africa

Who this guide is for

Anyone who has seen “FSCA-licensed” or “regulated” on a crypto platform’s home page and wants to check the claim against the regulator’s own record, and anyone deciding whether an unlicensed platform’s lower fee is worth the difference.

What the licence is

The FSCA licenses CASPs as financial services providers under the Financial Advisory and Intermediary Services (FAIS) Act. Its December 2025 press release states that, as at 12 December 2025, it had received 512 CASP licence applications, approved 300 and declined 14. Its 15 April 2026 release updates this to 533 received, 310 approved, 17 declined and 124 withdrawn as at 31 March 2026. It repeats that any person conducting CASP activities without a licence is subject to enforcement action. The licence is recorded against a legal entity with an FSP number, a licence category and a list of authorised activities: Category I covers advice and intermediary services, and Category II adds discretionary investment management. Both releases note that the FSCA’s powers are limited to those services and that the South African Reserve Bank does not recognise crypto assets as currency.

Separately, licensed platforms are accountable institutions under the FIC Act and must verify their clients; the FSCA’s December 2025 release confirms it supervises their anti-money-laundering controls. That is why every licensed platform asks for identity documents, which our KYC guide explains.

The verified entries

The March 2026 list is a 38-page PDF whose Section A lists licensed CASPs by number, FSP number, legal name, category and authorised activities. The four platforms below were found in that section when we read the list on 27 September 2026, when no later list was on the FSCA website, and each also publishes the same FSP number on its own site. The FSCA’s 15 April 2026 release gives totals but names no providers.

What each platform adds about the company behind the entry:

• VALR: South African customers contract with VALR (Pty) Ltd, registration 2018/211274/07. VALR states that its futures product is provided by group entity VALR DAM (Pty) Ltd, an FSCA-licensed financial services provider (FSP 54897) and over-the-counter derivatives provider; that number is not on the crypto asset service provider list, so it rests on VALR’s statement.
• Luno: Luno’s licences page adds that Luno (Pty) Ltd is a registered credit provider (NCRCP22123) and is registered with the Financial Intelligence Centre under AI/130605/00024.
• AltCoinTrader: the list prints the name with a space; the company’s FAIS disclosure document and terms use the registration number 2015/418624/07, which is the safer thing to match.
• Ovex: its general terms (version 1.9, last updated 15 June 2026) name Ovex (Pty) Ltd (2018/218598/07) as the entity for residents of the Common Monetary Area and for rand-denominated pairs, and say that it markets the separate OVEX FX service as a juristic representative of Ovex FSP (Pty) Ltd.

Platforms not on the list

Binance does not appear anywhere in the list titled March 2026 (read on 27 September 2026). Its South Africa page says it “operates in South Africa in compliance with local financial regulations and is actively engaged in South Africa’s Crypto Asset Service Provider (CASP) licensing process”. Its support pages state that services are provided by Binance ADGM entities regulated in Abu Dhabi: Nest Services Limited, with Nest Clearing and Custody Limited and Nest Trading Limited from 5 January 2026. We record its status as not found in the register, neither refused nor pending. Whether the application has since been approved is an open question, because the April 2026 release names no providers and the March 2026 list does not include it.

Kraken does not appear under Kraken, Payward or Crypto Facilities, and Kraken’s legal disclosures page lists no South African authorisation. Kraken also has no ZAR deposit or withdrawal rail, so the licence question is academic for most South Africans.

Bybit was not researched beyond the list search below; its serving entity, rails and fees are unknown until we read them on official pages.

We searched the list titled March 2026, all sections (A: licensed; B: product categories removed; C: lapsed; D: provisionally withdrawn), for the names of platforms South Africans often ask about.

No entry under these names is not proof that no company in the group holds a licence: a licence can sit with a local company that has a different name, as Parsa shows for Bitget. It does mean the brand’s own name is not on the regulator’s list, so ask the platform which entity would hold your account and search the list for that entity’s FSP number, as described next.

How to check a platform yourself

1. Find the platform’s own legal or disclosure page and note the exact legal entity name, company registration number and FSP number. A brand name is not enough; the licence belongs to a company.
2. Open the FSCA’s regulated-entities pages and the latest “list of licensed crypto asset service providers” PDF, and search for the FSP number. Match the number and the registration or legal name, not just the brand, because spellings differ (AltCoin Trader versus AltCoinTrader).
3. Read Sections C and D of the list as well as Section A: they record licences that have lapsed or been provisionally withdrawn.
4. Check the date of the list you are reading. Approvals continue (300 in December 2025, 310 by March 2026), so a platform absent from an older list may appear on a newer one, and a platform present may have lost its licence since.
5. Treat “application in process”, “regulated elsewhere” or a licence held by a different group company as not licensed in South Africa for the service you are using.

What a licence does and does not do

A licence tells you the entity is authorised, supervised for conduct, and required to verify clients and keep records. It does not tell you that the coins it sells are safe, that the platform cannot fail, that your balance is insured, or that the price you pay is fair. Fees at licensed platforms range from 0 % on Ovex’s quoted trades to 0.60 % taker at Luno and AltCoinTrader, and the cheapest headline rate on our pages, Binance’s 0.10 %, belongs to a platform that is not on the list. The licence is the first filter in our guide to choosing an exchange, not the last.

If something goes wrong: complaints

A licence also gives you somewhere to complain. Since crypto assets became a financial product in October 2022, the Office of the FAIS Ombud can investigate complaints against providers the FSCA has licensed, free of charge. First take the complaint to the provider, in writing if you can, and give it six weeks to resolve it. After the provider’s final response you have six months to go to the Ombud, and no more than three years from when you became aware of the problem. You can lodge the complaint online, by e-mail or by post.

The Ombud cannot help with an unlicensed platform. Its release of 24 June 2026 says that in its previous financial year 42 % of the crypto complaints it received were dismissed for that reason, most of them against providers based outside South Africa.

Availability limitations

All four licensed platforms pay rand only to a South African bank account in the account holder’s own name, and Ovex requires full verification before any deposit. Binance’s South African users contract with offshore entities, and which of its products beyond spot, Earn and P2P are open to South Africans is not confirmed on an official page.

Risks

Licence status is a dated fact: the four entries above were read in the list titled March 2026, and the FSCA can withdraw or suspend a licence at any time. A licensed entity can still change its terms, pause withdrawals or fail, and crypto asset prices are volatile regardless of who sells them. Phishing sites copy licence badges, so check the regulator’s document, not a logo. Nothing here is legal or financial advice.

Next steps

Compare the four licensed platforms on fees and rails in best crypto exchanges in South Africa, or filter by licence status in the exchange finder. For the other rules that apply to crypto in South Africa (anti-money-laundering checks, the travel rule, tax and exchange control), see is crypto legal in South Africa?.