Cryptocurrency regulations in Asia: How to comply

Asia is among the world’s largest and most active markets for cryptocurrency trading, and it has one of the most diverse regulatory landscapes. Crypto regulations in Asia span a spectrum: some jurisdictions have established comprehensive licensing regimes for digital assets, while others restrict or ban them to address fraud and money laundering risks.

Understanding crypto regulations is a necessary first step for firms planning to expand their crypto business or get to grips with prevailing anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) standards for cryptocurrencies in Asia.

1. Singapore crypto regulations
2. Hong Kong crypto regulations
3. Japan crypto regulations
4. South Korea crypto regulations
5. India crypto regulations
6. Indonesia crypto regulations
7. China crypto regulations
8. Malaysia crypto regulations
9. Vietnam crypto regulations
10. Thailand crypto regulations
11. Taiwan crypto regulations

Singapore crypto regulations 

Singapore operates one of Asia’s most developed licensing regimes for digital assets, overseen by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) across two tracks. The Payment Services Act 2019 (PSA), amended in 2021, licenses digital payment token (DPT) service providers serving Singapore customers. The Financial Services and Markets Act 2022 (FSM Act) extends MAS oversight to Singapore-based firms serving only overseas customers: under the Digital Token Service Provider (DTSP) regime, in force since June 30, 2025, such firms require a license, and MAS has stated it will grant DTSP licenses only in extremely limited circumstances.

MAS has also tightened conduct rules for the retail market, phasing in requirements during 2024 that ban credit purchases of DPTs by retail customers, restrict staking and lending to retail investors, and require customer assets to be held under a statutory trust.

On stablecoins, MAS finalized its regulatory framework for single-currency stablecoins on August 15, 2023, covering full reserve backing and redemption at par within five business days. MAS has indicated it intends to introduce legislation to give the framework legal force in 2026.

Hong Kong crypto regulations 

Hong Kong’s virtual asset service provider (VASP) licensing regime, in force since June 1, 2023, under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Ordinance (AMLO), is among the most comprehensive in the region. Licensed virtual asset trading platforms (VATPs) are treated as financial institutions and subject to the same AML/CFT requirements – 13 platforms held licenses from the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) as of July 2026.

The perimeter continues to widen. The Stablecoins Ordinance took effect on August 1, 2025, requiring fiat-referenced stablecoin issuers to be licensed by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA); the first two licenses were granted to Anchorpoint Financial and HSBC on April 10, 2026. The SFC’s ASPIRe roadmap, published in February 2025, set out 12 initiatives to develop the virtual asset market, and legislation extending licensing to virtual asset dealing and custody services is expected before the Legislative Council in 2026.

Japan crypto regulations 

The Japanese regulatory stance toward the crypto sector has been historically accommodating. Japan’s Payment Services Act (PSA) classifies crypto-assets as legal property, and exchanges are legal if registered with the Financial Services Agency (FSA). AML/CFT obligations sit under the Act on Prevention of Transfer of Criminal Proceeds, and the FATF Travel Rule has applied to crypto-asset exchange providers since June 1, 2023.

Japan moved early on stablecoins: since June 2023, stablecoins classified as electronic payment instruments (EPIs) may only be issued by banks, trust companies, and registered funds-transfer providers, and businesses dealing in them require registration. A further PSA amendment passed in June 2025 – taking operational effect in June 2026, according to legal analyses – creates a new intermediary (brokerage) category and gives authorities the power to order domestic asset holding.

The most significant shift is reclassification. In April 2026, Japan’s Cabinet approved a bill moving crypto-assets from the PSA into the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act (FIEA), bringing disclosure duties and insider-trading rules to the sector, with reports that the Diet passed the bill in July 2026 and implementation targeted for fiscal year 2027. The reform is linked to a planned move from progressive taxation to a separate tax rate of around 20% on crypto gains. Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) that cannot be used as a means of payment generally remain outside the crypto AML regime, although the FSA has been reviewing the regulatory perimeter since April 2025.

South Korea crypto regulations 

South Korea has moved from ad-hoc restrictions to a dedicated statutory framework. The Virtual Asset User Protection Act (VAUPA), in force since July 19, 2024, requires exchanges to segregate customer deposits with banks, hold at least 80% of customer assets in cold storage, and maintain insurance or reserves – and it introduces criminal penalties for market manipulation and other unfair trading. The Financial Services Commission (FSC) and Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) supervise the sector, supported by a statutory Virtual Asset Committee that first met in November 2024. These rules sit alongside the 2021 AML Act requirements: Information Security Management System (ISMS) certification, reporting to the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), and real-name bank accounts.

Liberalization is underway in parallel. In February 2025, the FSC announced a phased roadmap for corporate participation in the virtual asset market, gradually lifting the de facto ban on corporate trading accounts – starting with non-profits and universities, then listed companies and professional investors. A second-phase bill, the Digital Asset Basic Act – covering issuance, listing, disclosure, and stablecoins – has been advancing under the Lee Jae-Myung government, with passage targeted for the second half of 2026. As of July 2026, it remains pending.

India crypto regulations 

Cryptocurrency in India remains legal to hold and trade but is not legal tender, and there is still no comprehensive regulatory framework. The 2021 Cryptocurrency and Regulation of Official Digital Currency Bill was never introduced in Parliament, and the government has said it awaits international consensus – via the G20 and the IMF-FSB roadmap – before legislating comprehensively.

Regulation has instead arrived piecemeal, and with real force. Since March 7, 2023, the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) has applied to virtual digital asset (VDA) service providers, which must register with the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU-IND) as reporting entities and apply full know your customer (KYC) and AML obligations. On tax, the 30% flat rate on VDA gains and 1% tax deducted at source (TDS) on transfers both remain in force, carried into the Income Tax Act 2025, with enhanced transaction-reporting obligations for exchanges applying from April 1, 2026. Losses still cannot be offset against other income, and gifted crypto remains taxable for recipients.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) continues to expand its central bank digital currency (CBDC) pilots rather than fully launching: the retail digital rupee (e₹) pilot, running since December 2022, had reached roughly seven million users by early 2026, with new programmable-payment trials underway.

Indonesia crypto regulations 

Indonesia’s ban on cryptocurrencies as a payment instrument, in place since 2017, still stands – but the supervisory architecture has changed fundamentally. On January 10, 2025, the regulatory authority was transferred from the commodities regulator, Bappebti, to the Financial Services Authority (OJK) under the P2SK Law and OJK Regulation 27/2024. Crypto is now classified as a digital financial asset rather than a commodity, with the full transition window running to January 2027.

Licensed trading continues under the new regime: OJK published a whitelist of licensed trading platforms in December 2025 (29 operators, including Indodax, Tokocrypto, Pintu, Upbit, and Reku), and the national crypto bourse launched in July 2023 now operates under OJK approval as the Digital Financial Asset Bourse, maintaining the list of tradeable assets.

China crypto regulations 

Financial institutions in China have been banned from handling Bitcoin transactions since 2013, and the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) restricted initial coin offerings (ICOs) in 2017. In 2021, China banned all cryptocurrency trading, exchange services, and domestic mining – and that comprehensive ban remains fully in force. In early 2026, regulators reinforced it, explicitly extending restrictions to real-world-asset (RWA) tokenization and to offshore yuan-pegged stablecoins issued without approval.

Mainland China’s digital asset activity is instead channeled through its CBDC. The e-CNY continues to expand, with the PBOC opening a dedicated international operations center in Shanghai in September 2025 as part of a wider internationalization push. Meanwhile, experimentation with offshore yuan-denominated stablecoins is taking place under Hong Kong’s separate licensing regime rather than on the mainland – a divergence between the two systems that regional compliance teams need to track.

Malaysia crypto regulations 

Cryptocurrencies are legal in Malaysia but are not legal tender, a position Bank Negara Malaysia has held since 2014. Digital currencies and tokens are prescribed as securities under the Capital Markets and Services (Prescription of Securities) (Digital Currency and Digital Token) Order 2019, regulated by the Securities Commission Malaysia (SC), with digital asset exchanges (DAX) registered under the Guidelines on Recognized Markets.

Five registered DAX operators were on the SC’s official list as of June 2026: HATA Digital, Luno Malaysia, MX Global, SINEGY DAX, and Kinetic DAX. The framework is liberalizing: following a June 2025 consultation, the SC has moved to let exchange operators list digital assets without prior SC approval, subject to security audits and track-record criteria, alongside enhanced client-asset segregation and governance requirements. Registered exchanges need to demonstrate the fitness of senior management and their ability to manage AML/CFT risk, and abide by ongoing AML/CFT obligations, including customer due diligence (CDD) measures and suspicious transaction reporting (STR).

Vietnam crypto regulations 

Vietnam has moved from legal silence to formal recognition. The Law on Digital Technology Industry, passed on June 14, 2025, and in force since January 1, 2026, gives crypto assets legal status as assets under the Civil Code for the first time – with state oversight focused on cybersecurity and AML/CFT. Crypto remains excluded from recognized means of payment.

A regulated market is being piloted in parallel. Resolution 05/2025, dated September 9, 2025, launched a five-year pilot under which the Ministry of Finance licenses crypto service providers – with high entry requirements, including roughly $380 million in charter capital, majority institutional ownership, and Vietnamese dong-only transactions. The State Securities Commission began receiving license applications by January 2026, and domestic investors trading outside licensed providers face sanctions once the first licenses are issued. Adoption remains among the highest globally: Vietnam ranked fourth in Chainalysis’ 2025 Global Crypto Adoption Index, behind India, the US, and Pakistan.

Thailand crypto regulations 

The Securities and Exchange Commission of Thailand (SEC) regulates cryptoassets under the Emergency Decree on Digital Asset Businesses B.E. 2561 (2018). Under Thai law, crypto can be legally owned and traded but not used as a means of payment, and digital asset businesses require a license. Licensed providers are classed as financial institutions and subject to the same AML regulations as other firms, including CDD, KYC processes, and transaction reporting.

Two recent shifts stand out. First, royal decrees signed in April 2025 require foreign platforms – including peer-to-peer services – serving Thai users to hold a Thai SEC license, with the power to block non-compliant platforms and penalties of up to 3 years’ imprisonment; enforcement continued through 2025 and into 2026. Second, Thailand has paired enforcement with incentives: a five-year personal income tax exemption on capital gains from digital asset sales applies from January 1, 2025, to December 31, 2029 – provided that trades are conducted through SEC-licensed platforms.

Taiwan crypto regulations 

Taiwan has moved quickly from minimal oversight to a dedicated regime. Under amendments to the Money Laundering Control Act, virtual asset service providers have to complete AML registration with the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) – a regime in force since November 30, 2024, with unregistered operation carrying up to two years’ imprisonment and fines of up to NT$5 million. Nine VASPs were registered as of September 2025.

A full licensing statute is next. The Virtual Asset Service Act – creating FSC licensing across seven VASP categories and an approval regime for stablecoin issuance – passed its third reading in the Legislative Yuan on June 30, 2026, according to legal analyses, with penalties of up to seven years’ imprisonment for unlicensed operation. As of July 2026, the Act has passed but is not yet in force; its commencement date will be set separately.

Best AML/CFT compliance practices for crypto providers

As regulators across Asia extend fiat-style obligations to digital assets, crypto providers face compliance expectations – and penalties – much like those imposed on traditional financial institutions. Firms can prepare by observing several core best practices:

1. Hiring subject-matter experts from the fiat industry: Because AML/CFT is newer to the cryptoasset industry, most experienced practitioners built their careers in traditional financial markets.
2. Conducting a thorough risk assessment: This helps firms understand their exposure to financial crime risks and allocate resources effectively.
3. Establishing a solid understanding of ML/TF typologies: Especially as they apply to cryptoassets – this provides a reliable basis for screening and monitoring.
4. Investing in compliance technology that matches the risk: A natural extension of VASPs’ technology-forward stance, equipping compliance teams with tooling designed for crypto’s speed and transaction complexity.

Cryptocurrency AML solutions

Rather than building compliance processes from scratch, crypto firms can look for solutions that help automate them, including:

• Onboarding and identity verification: To mitigate the risks associated with crypto’s rapid, pseudo-anonymous transactions, firms benefit from tools that quickly and accurately establish a customer’s risk profile. Adverse media checks, for example, can be made more reliable using natural language processing, a type of artificial intelligence (AI) that helps surface results relevant to the customer being researched.
• Customer Screening and Ongoing Monitoring: After onboarding, crypto firms need to monitor customers for changes – additions to sanctions or watchlists, changes in politically exposed person (PEP) status, or notable changes affecting relatives and close associates (RCAs). A solution that continuously monitors customer profiles helps teams act on red flags quickly.
• Transaction Monitoring: This is where crypto firms and traditional banking diverge most. Given the complexity of crypto transactions, machine learning (ML) models can detect hidden connections between accounts that may indicate offenses such as fraud, human or wildlife trafficking, and money laundering – signals that are difficult to spot through manual analysis alone. They can also reduce false positives, freeing analysts to focus on higher-risk cases.

With a firm understanding of current regional and national regulations and up-to-date AML technology, crypto firms operating in Asia can treat compliance as a competitive advantage rather than a constraint.