Posted by The Seychelles Government has recently enacted its Virtual Asset Service Provider (“VASP”) legislation, effective from 1 September 2024 (please refer here and here for the legislation). Under the VASP Act, a VASP is defined as a person that conducts one or more activities as listed under the First Schedule of the Act.
A complete set of associated VASP Regulations, Code, Guidelines and Circulars can also be found on the Seychelles Financial Services Authority (“FSA”) website here.
It is crucial to ensure that any Seychelles entity’s operations falling within the scope of VASP activities are appropriately licensed in accordance with the updated legal framework. Application Guidelines can also be found here for your reference.
If you are operating as a VASP in Seychelles, you are required to submit a complete application for a VASP licence by 31 December 2024 to comply with the new legislation. The FSA has further issued a Press Release here, where it has published an identified list of Seychelles companies to be operating as a VASP without a licence.
In the meantime, you may continue to conduct the relevant business activities until the application for a licence is considered or a registrant is authorised to issue an initial coin offering or a non-fungible token and such decision shall be communicated in writing to the applicant by the FSA.