Kazakhstan Agrees to Allow Crypto Exchanges to Register Bank Accounts

Kazakhstan will establish a pilot project for crypto exchanges in the special economic zone of the Astana International Finance Centre, in addition to its rapid progress toward legalizing crypto mining. On Thursday, Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Digital Development, Innovations, and Aerospace Industry unveiled a trial initiative involving cryptocurrency exchanges and a few local banks. The working group, which included representatives from the Ministry of Digital Development, the National Bank, the Financial Monitoring Agency, the Association of Financiers, the Astana International Finance Centre, and financial and crypto market stakeholders, formulated the guidelines for that collaboration. Astana Financial Service Authority The exchanges granted a license by the newly constituted Astana Financial Service Authority will be part of the pilot project, which will run until the end of 2022. (AFSA). It will serve as a template for Kazakhstan’s future development as a regional crypto powerhouse. On the AIFC website, detailed guidelines should be available soon. Nurhat Kushimov, the chairman of AFSA, stated that his committee’s objective is to establish an atmosphere in which trustworthy and sustainable businesses can operate: “The Astana Financial Service Authority is the only entity responsible for regulating the fintech companies’ activities in Kazakhstan. Before handing out the licence to a fintech company, we conduct a deep and thor...