Physical Address

304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124

Nigeria Removed from FATF “Grey List”: What It Means for Foreign Entrants, Existing Businesses, and Everyday People

TL;DR

Nigeria has been removed from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) “grey list” following the October 22–24, 2025 plenary in Paris. This reflects improvements in anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing (AML/CFT) and is widely expected to ease capital flows, reduce perceived risk, and lower friction for cross-border banking and trade. Mozambique and Burkina Faso were also removed at the same plenary.

First: what is the FATF “Grey List”?

  • FATF = Financial Action Task Force. They set global rules to stop dirty money and terrorist financing.
  • The Grey List is like being on a watchlist. Countries there are working to fix gaps.
  • Coming off the Grey List means Nigeria has improved its checks and controls.

Think of it like driving:
If your car had a warning light on, banks abroad treated you carefully. The warning light just turned off.

What changed on Friday?

  • FATF announced Nigeria is no longer on the Grey List.
  • A few other countries were removed too.
  • This follows a review where Nigeria showed better anti-money laundering systems, stronger government coordination, and improved enforcement.

What just happened (and why it matters)

Why this is material for business: Grey listing is associated with tighter correspondent banking, higher borrowing costs, and weaker investor appetite. Multiple analyses and prior cases show grey listing can drag on capital inflows and raise the cost of doing business. Removal tends to improve risk perception and financing conditions.

What this means for foreign companies entering Nigeria

  1. Smoother bank relationships and payments
    Expect less friction in cross-border payments, easier maintenance of correspondent bank lines, and greater willingness by international banks to process transactions tied to Nigerian counterparties—assuming continued compliance discipline.
  2. Potentially lower risk premiums and financing costs
    As risk perception normalizes, foreign firms may see improved access to trade finance, lower insurance premia, and better terms from global lenders that flag FATF status as a due-diligence variable.
  3. Accelerated market entry timelines
    Compliance reviews won’t disappear, but the default stance becomes less cautious, which can shorten onboarding with global banks, PSPs, and card networks—especially when paired with a strong local payments partner.
  4. Momentum for partnerships
    International VAS providers, PSPs, and BaaS platforms often gate expansion on FATF posture. The removal unlocks partner greenlights and co-go-to-market opportunities faster than before.

If you’re planning entry, this is the moment to stand up a local-rails portfolio (bank transfer + leading wallets + cards + QR/direct debit as needed) and finalize settlement calendars and reconciliation—the pieces that convert approvals into cash. Talk to us.

What this means for businesses already operating in Nigeria

  • Banking & treasury: Potential for easier cross-border flows and fewer compliance hurdles with overseas counterparties. Still keep playbooks sharp (screening, documentation, audit trails).
  • Cost of capital & trade finance: Expect gradual improvement in pricing/availability as lenders recalibrate. Track updates from your banks over the next 1–3 quarters.
  • Vendor and partner onboarding: Some foreign vendors paused or restricted features during grey listing. Re-engage them now with updated risk memos referencing the FATF outcome page to remove internal “red flags.”
  • AML/CFT operations: Don’t step off the gas. FATF removal doesn’t end obligations—monitoring and enforcement continue. Maintain rigorous KYC/KYB, transaction monitoring, and SAR/STR processes.

What it means for everyday people and SMEs

  • Better access to financial services: When international banks and payment networks view a market as lower risk, more services become available—from cross-border payouts to merchant services—often at better prices.
  • Improved investor confidence and jobs: Reduced risk perception can boost FDI and portfolio inflows, helping investment, growth, and, over time, jobs.
  • Consumer protection upside: AML/CFT improvements usually come with better dispute processes, data hygiene, and fraud reduction that benefit consumers and small businesses.

What changed to make delisting possible?

FATF’s communiqué highlights strengthened AML/CFT effectiveness, inter-agency coordination, better FIU capacity, risk-based supervision, and other reforms reviewed since June 2025. Nigeria’s removal reflects progress against an agreed action plan assessed during the October 2025 plenary.

Local authorities also framed delisting as a boost to financial credibility, reinforcing reform momentum.

What you should do next (Foreign entrants & multinationals)

  1. Update your internal risk memos
    Attach the FATF Plenary Outcomes and the Increased Monitoring page to your files. This helps push partner and bank reviews over the line.
  2. Re-score Nigeria in your market-entry model
    Adjust assumptions on correspondent risk, bank onboarding timelines, and capital costs. Use our Nigeria Entry Payments Checklist to structure your pilot.
  3. Turn on a local-rails portfolio
    Pair wallets for everyday purchases with bank transfer for higher-ticket orders and cards/QR as needed. Route by ticket size and risk, and instrument auth→success, settlement time, reconciliation time.
  4. Instrument compliance to scale
    Keep staged KYB/KYC, robust transaction monitoring, and audit-ready logs. Delisting is not a license to relax; it’s a platform to grow responsibly.

What you should do next (Nigerian businesses of all sizes)

  • Renegotiate banking and PSP terms leveraging improved risk posture.
  • Expand cross-border channels (exports, digital services) where prior restrictions bit hardest.
  • Publish trust signals (e.g., clear policy pages, dispute timelines, status/incidents) to align with global counterpart expectations and win new partners.
  • Tighten reconciliation to shorten month-end and reduce cash-flow anxiety.

Risk caveats and long-term signals

  • Delisting is great but it’s not immunity. Continued compliance performance is critical; FATF can reinstate monitoring if standards slip.
  • Global context matters. Other jurisdictions remain on high-risk lists; counterparties still screen transactions and entities. “Lower friction” doesn’t mean “friction-free.” 
  • Market response is gradual. While the policy change is immediate, bank policy changes, pricing, and product availability tend to adjust over quarters, not days.

FAQs

What is the FATF grey list?
A list of countries under increased monitoring that are actively fixing strategic AML/CFT gaps under a time-bound action plan. It is not the same as the “blacklist.” 

When was Nigeria removed?
At the FATF Plenary held October 22–24, 2025 in Paris; outcome published October 24, 2025.

How does delisting affect cross-border payments?
It generally reduces perceived risk, which can ease correspondent banking and improve the availability and pricing of cross-border services—subject to each bank’s own risk policy.

Will financing get cheaper immediately?
Expect gradual improvement as lenders and investors recalibrate risk models over the next few quarters.

Does this change compliance obligations?
No. KYC/KYB, screening, monitoring, reporting, and data controls remain essential—and often become easier to operationalize with better counterpart cooperation.

How Transactpay comes in

Transactpay is built for Africa-ready, Nigeria-first market entry:

  • Local rails that convert: bank transfers, leading wallets, QR, cards, direct debit
  • Low-end device performance: lean SDKs, SMS fallbacks, retry logic aligned to bank windows
  • Settlement confidence: predictable T+X, clean reconciliation exports/APIs
  • Compliance clarity: staged KYB/KYC, dispute timelines, status/incidents in plain English

How Transactpay can help right now

If you’re entering or scaling in Nigeria, we’ll help you set up local rails that just work:

  • Bank transfer + leading wallets + cards + QR/direct debit
  • Fast checkout on low-end Android (small files, SMS fallback, smart retries)
  • Predictable settlements and clean reconciliation
  • Clear, plain-English support and documentation

Next step:

Plan your Nigeria entry with Transactpay.

Book a FREE 30-minute diagnostic