🎉 Pakistan🇵🇰 reopens its banking system to the crypto sector after six years of restrictions

🎉 Pakistan🇵🇰 reopens its banking system to the crypto sector after six years of restrictions

In May 2025, Pakistan’s authorities announced plans to establish a national strategic bitcoin reserve, and in early 2026they enacted a virtual assets law, marking a broader shift toward regulatory integration of the sector. The process is moving forward.

➡️ To cooperate with banks, crypto companies will need a license issued by the Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA). Banks, for their part, will be required to maintain separate non-interest-bearing customer accounts in rupees.

➡️ Despite the policy shift, financial institutions are not permitted to invest in virtual assets or hold them on their own balance sheets.

➡️ Banks remain responsible for enhanced due diligence, risk assessment, and the monitoring of suspicious transactions, in line with compliance requirements.

➡️ Context: the restrictions introduced in 2018 did not curb demand but instead pushed crypto activity into informal channels. Even so, the market continued to expand and, according to data from the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry, usage grew by more than 700% in the following years. By early 2024, most retail crypto transactions were conducted through informal peer-to-peer (P2P) channels or so-called “Digital Hundi” networks.

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