Foreign exchange law: Entry into force and regulatory measures

Applied in accordance with the decision of the President of the Republic, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, this instruction set the amount at €750 (or the equivalent in freely convertible currency) for persons aged 19 and over, and €300 for persons aged between 12 and under 19, with a limit of two children per family.

This foreign exchange entitlement is granted once a year, for a minimum stay of seven days, and remains exclusively reserved for the beneficiary. The currency amount is issued at the point of departure from the national territory, upon presentation of the payment receipt, passport and boarding pass, or during border formalities for travellers by land.

These are, in short, the main measures contained in this instruction, the application of which has been tightened up at the end of this year due to illegal practices. In December, the BA issued three successive notes to refocus the implementation of the instruction and regulate the operation. The aim is to put an end to the excesses that have been recorded, according to the BA's explanations.

The new conditions imposed by the BA for benefiting from this right can be summarised as follows: obligation to hold a bank account, prohibition of cash payments, and reimbursement of the exchange fee charged in the event of a stay abroad lasting less than seven days. These conditions were set out in two memos sent to banks on December  15 and 16.

This was followed by another tightening of the rules by a note dated 23 December 2025. In this letter, the institution reiterated that "the granting of foreign exchange rights for travel abroad is a strictly personal right. As such, the BA specified that "payment of the dinar equivalent of the foreign exchange rights must be made exclusively by the beneficiary themselves or by a person related to them.

This is a way to end the misappropriation of funds by certain individuals, given that several cases have revealed that networks have organised trips, particularly to Tunisia, to divert the €750 granted at the official rate to the parallel currency market.

The Minister of the Interior, Local Authorities and Transport, Saïd Sayoud, even indicated in this context that numerous cases of fraud and abuse had been recorded in the use of the tourist allowance, stating that nearly 100,000 cases of fraud had been identified in the space of a month and a half.