Pakistan gives crypto firms less than two weeks to register or halt service
Regulation & Gov ·
The country's virtual assets regulator has opened applications under a new licensing law, with a September 5 cutoff for companies already active in the market.
Firms that were serving Pakistani customers on or before March 5, when the Virtual Assets Act 2026 took effect, now fall under a "transitional persons" category and must file for a No Objection Certificate by September 5, according to Decrypt. Continuing to operate past that date without an application on file is treated as an offense under Section 70 of the Act. The Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority's portal is also accepting applications for full licenses and for entry into a regulatory sandbox.
The framework spans 11 license categories, covering exchanges, custody, brokerage, advisory work, lending and borrowing, derivatives, discretionary asset management, settlement services, mining infrastructure, and issuance of tokens tied to assets or a single fiat currency, with firms allowed to apply across multiple categories. To qualify, applicants must incorporate a company inside Pakistan, meet capital thresholds set for their category, subject directors and key staff to fitness checks, and maintain anti-money-laundering controls along with cybersecurity and continuity plans. Licensed firms are also required to keep client funds segregated from company assets and barred from lending or pledging those holdings without written consent.
Chairman Bilal bin Saqib presented the rules in a televised address, framing them as investor protection and a route to bring stablecoins and tokenization into export financing, remittances and small-business lending. In practice, the process runs in sequence: once a No Objection Certificate is granted, a firm must register with the Financial Monitoring Unit, set up a local subsidiary, and only then apply for the license itself — meaning offshore exchanges serving Pakistani users will need a Pakistan-based entity to keep operating. Binance and HTX already hold certificates, per the same report.
The rollout follows Pakistan's recent lifting of an eight-year restriction on banks working with crypto businesses, which had been a major barrier for the sector, and licensees will now gain access to formal banking channels as part of compliance. PVARA itself was formed by presidential ordinance in July 2025 and made permanent through this year's Act; a second outlet, CoinDesk, also confirmed the September 5 registration deadline.
Still unclear is how many currently operating firms will meet the deadline, how strictly enforcement will proceed against those that miss it, and how quickly offshore exchanges can stand up local subsidiaries to satisfy the incorporation requirement.