United Arab Emirates · Payments & e-money
Checkout MENA FZ L.L.C
Checkout MENA FZ-LLC is a Dubai free zone company and the UAE contracting entity of the Checkout.com payments group, which is headquartered in London. The Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE) licenses the firm as a provider of Retail Payment Services under identification number 08.01.02.008.2023.02, granted in May 2023. It provides merchant acquiring, payment processing and payouts to businesses, not to consumers. In July 2026 the group announced in-principle CBUAE approval for a Stored Value Facilities licence to add card issuing in the UAE.
Licences and registrations
Held by Checkout MENA FZ L.L.C. 1 entry on 1 of the 22 tracked registers, retrieved 24 September 2026.
| Register | Licence | Number | Jurisdiction | Status | Registered | Ends | Activities | Register entry |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CBUAE Register of Licensed Financial Institutions - Retail Payment ServicesCentral Bank of the UAE (CBUAE) | Retail Payment ServicesPayment Institution | 08.01.02.008.2023.02 | United Arab Emirates | Active | — | — |
|
Search the register ↗ |
- Each licence applies in the country of the regulator that granted it.
- Registers are tracked in 37 countries. Licences granted elsewhere are not recorded here.
Swift network
Swift’s ISO 9362 BIC directory
Holds no BIC in Swift’s directory. No LEI is matched to this entry, and BICs are linked by LEI only.
Overview
Researched 29 Sep 2026 · Sources
Customers
Not published
Employees
Not published
Ownership
Group subsidiary
Firm type
Merchant acquiring and processing
Trades as Checkout.com
- Ownership
- The firm belongs to the Checkout.com group, headquartered in London. Its direct parent is not named in the firm's published documents.
- Head office
- Office No. 1601-1609, Floor 16, Al Shatha Tower, Dubai Media City, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
- Company register
- Dubai Development Authority 92041
- Founder
- Guillaume Pousaz
Online
- Websites & references
- checkout.com ↗
support.checkout.com ↗ merchant support centre
checkout.com/docs ↗ developer documentation
trust.checkout.com ↗ trust and security centre
Wikipedia ↗ group article - Official social accounts
- LinkedIn ↗ · X ↗ · Facebook ↗ · Instagram ↗ · YouTube ↗
Sources · 9 pages consulted
- checkout.com/legal/certificates
- checkout.com/legal/country-terms
- checkout.com
- checkout.com/contact-us
- checkout.com/leadership
- checkout.com/newsroom/checkout-com-uae-offering-in-principle-stored-value-facilities-licence
- checkout.com/newsroom/checkout-com-becomes-the-first-global-payments-platform-to-secure-acquiring-lice
- checkout.com/newsroom/statement-regarding-a-legacy-system-incident
- checkout.com/newsroom/checkout-com-raises-1-billion-in-series-d-amid-major-us-market-push
Authorisation
Researched 29 Sep 2026 · Sources
- Operates under
- Its own licences
The Central Bank of the UAE licenses the firm as a provider of Retail Payment Services under identification number 08.01.02.008.2023.02. The Dubai Development Authority registers and licenses the company in the Dubai free zone.
| Authority | Licence or registration | Number | Held | Status | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE) United Arab Emirates | Retail Payment Services (class Payment Institution) | 08.01.02.008.2023.02 | In its own name | Active | checkout.com ↗ |
| Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE) United Arab Emirates | Stored Value Facilities licence (in-principle approval) | — | In its own name | Applied for | checkout.com ↗ |
| Dubai Development Authority United Arab Emirates | Free zone company registration and licence | — | In its own name | Active | checkout.com ↗ |
Licences and registrations the research found, at home and abroad, as the firm and its regulators publish them. The Licences and registrations card shows the entries on the registers the directory tracks.
Partners and safeguarding
Researched 29 Sep 2026 · Sources
- Safeguarding
- Not disclosedThe firm's UAE terms state that merchant funds are safeguarded under articles 14.3 and 14.4 of the CBUAE Retail Payment Services and Card Schemes Regulation. The terms do not name the safeguarding bank.
- Payment schemes and card networks
- Mastercard Direct checkout.com ↗
Visa Through a partner checkout.com ↗
Banks and regulated firms the firm says hold its customers’ money, issue its cards, sponsor its accounts or settle its payments, as it discloses them in its terms and notices.
Products and markets
Researched 29 Sep 2026 · Sources
According to Checkout.com, the UAE licence lets it offer merchant acquiring, payment aggregation and cross-border fund transfers to merchants in the UAE.
The firm is the Checkout.com contracting entity for merchants in the United Arab Emirates under its CBUAE licence.
- Payment volume
- USD 300bntotal volume of ecommerce payments processed for enterprise merchants worldwide
- Sells to
- Enterprises · Platforms and marketplaces
- Serves customers in
- United Arab Emirates
- Latest funding round
- Series D · USD 1bn Jan 2022Led by Altimeter, Dragoneer, Franklin Templeton, GIC, Insight Partners, Qatar Investment Authority, Tiger Global, Oxford Endowment Fund
- Total raised
- USD 1.8bn to Jan 2022 · checkout.com ↗
Leadership
Researched 29 Sep 2026 · Sources
- Executive
- Remo Giovanni Abbondandolo General Manager, MENA
- Chief executive
- Guillaume Pousaz Founder and CEO (Checkout.com group)
- Chief financial officer
- Phil Symes Chief Financial Officer (Checkout.com group)
- Executive
- Emilie Mathieu General Counsel (Checkout.com group)
Recent events 1 enforcement or investigation item
Researched 29 Sep 2026 · Sources
-
Licence
The CBUAE granted Checkout.com in-principle approval for a Stored Value Facilities licence, which would add issuing to its UAE acquiring services.
checkout.com ↗ -
Security incident
Checkout.com disclosed that the ShinyHunters group had accessed a legacy third-party cloud storage system holding merchant onboarding documents and had demanded a ransom.
checkout.com ↗
Compliance-relevant events of the last three years, newest first: fines and enforcement, investigations, security incidents, licence changes, funding rounds, acquisitions and leadership changes. Each links to its source.
Identifiers
- Licence no. · CBUAE-RPS
- 08.01.02.008.2023.02
- BIC
- Holds no BIC in Swift’s directory
- LEI
- No LEI mapped
- Elucidate firm ID
- 4e74254334d4
Profile
- Type
- Payments & e-moneyPayment institutions, e-money and stored-value issuers, and account-information providers. Licensed under payment-services law (e.g. PSD2 in the EU and UK, the Payment Services Act in Singapore). Taken from the licences on the tracked registers.
- Regulation
- Prudential licenceAuthorised with capital, safeguarding and conduct requirements, e.g. an authorised payment or e-money institution in the EU or UK, a major payment institution in Singapore, or a MiCA crypto-asset service provider.
- Main licence class
- Payment Institution
- Activities
- Payment services
- Licensed in
- United Arab Emirates · Middle East & North Africa
- First registered
- Not published
Types come from Swift’s BIC classification, the licences on the 22 tracked registers, and the ECB and FSB bank lists. Most banks outside the euro area appear as financial institutions, because their supervisors’ registers are not tracked yet.
Ownership and group
GLEIF relationship records
No LEI is matched to this entry, so GLEIF relationship records cannot be linked.
Addresses
- Address on the register
- Dubai
- Country
- United Arab Emirates
ISO 20022 identification
As an agent in a Swift cross-border payment message (CBPR+)
This institution holds no BIC. A CBPR+ message identifies it by name and postal address, and may add its LEI or a clearing code.
- Identified by
- Name and postal address. No LEI or clearing code is mapped in the directory
- Postal address
- Structured: town and country
<FinInstnId>
<Nm>Checkout MENA FZ L.L.C</Nm>
<PstlAdr>
<TwnNm>Dubai</TwnNm>
<Ctry>AE</Ctry>
</PstlAdr>
</FinInstnId>CBPR+ identifies the instructing and instructed agents by BIC only. An institution without a BIC can be the debtor, creditor or an intermediary agent.
The values are as published by the register. Check them against your own records before use.
Sources & method
Register entries come from the public registers of financial regulators, standardised into one taxonomy. LEIs are matched through GLEIF, and a BIC is linked only through a shared LEI.
An institution missing from these registers is not necessarily unregulated.
Register entries are not matched against the OFAC or EU sanctions lists. Where the legal entity also holds a BIC, the matches for that BIC are on its page. Always screen against the official lists.
An institution is one entry in the directory: a BIC8 in Swift’s directory, or a firm on a tracked register that holds no BIC. Licences held by an institution with a BIC are shown on its page.
Read the methodology →Register for this page
- CBUAE Register of Licensed Financial Institutions - Retail Payment Services—Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE) · source ↗ as at 24 September 2026
- Overview, authorisation, partners, products, leadership and events—researched per institution by an AI model with web search, from the firm's own website, terms and filings, regulators' registers and notices, company registers and news. Licences, partners, figures, people and events link to their source, and each card shows the research date. AI research can be wrong or out of date, so check key facts at the source.
Assess the financial crime risk behind a licence
A licence records what an institution is authorised to do; it does not assess it. The Elucidate FinCrime Index (EFI) is an independent score of the financial crime risk of banks and payment institutions.
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