The cross-border payments specialist, which facilitates transactions between merchants and customers across emerging markets, will conduct UK operations through its subsidiary dLocal Opco UK.

The regulatory approval enables dLocal to directly onboard British merchants for the first time, following previous limitations imposed in the wake of Brexit.

Since its founding in 2016, the company has carved out a niche processing payments in developing economies across Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Its platform allows businesses to accept local currency payments while settling in major global currencies.

“The differentiating factor for us when we think of our UK base of merchants is that the geographies where we serve them, and those are the only geographies we work,” chief executive Pedro Arnt said.

Arnt noted that “the UK has become a hub for many global companies — even the American companies, some Asian companies — for their emerging market expansion, primarily in Africa, and in some cases LatAm.”

The FCA authorisation allows dLocal to onboard UK merchants through its local entity for the first time, an important regulatory development as it expands into developed markets while maintaining its focus on emerging market payment infrastructure.

dLocal will compete in a UK payments landscape that includes established players such as Worldpay, Checkout.com, PayPal, Stripe, Adyen, Mollie, and Revolut.