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The financial authorities in Kazakhstan have restricted access to a staggering number of online platforms providing crypto exchange services over the past year. The tally comes amid efforts to comprehensively regulate and expand the legal crypto market in the country, which aims to become a regional hub for digital assets. Hundreds of illegal crypto exchange services taken offline in Kazakhstan The Financial Monitoring Agency of Kazakhstan (AFM) has prevented more than 1,100 unlicensed online exchangers from providing services in the Central Asian nation. The figure was announced by its head, Zhanat Elimanov, who reported on the watchdog’s operations in 2025 to President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev this week. Quoted by the Kazakhstanskaya Pravda daily on Monday, the official revealed his subordinates have completed investigations into 1,135 criminal cases involving money and returned 141.5 billion tenge (over $277 million) to victims of such crimes last year. The government body has also dismantled 15 criminal groups and 29 organizations providing cash services outside the law and thwarted the activities of 22 shadow crypto exchanges allegedly laundering proceeds from drug trafficking and fraud schemes. Meanwhile, the financial sector has stopped dealing with approximately 2,000 companies and 56,000 individuals suspected of money laundering. A total of 2.1 trillion tenge of criminal flows (over $4 billion) have been detected with the help of 35 payment institutions. The AFM has also frozen some 20,000 bank card accounts used by money mules working for criminals, Elimanov added during the briefing of the president. For his part, Tokaev issued a number of instructions in key areas of responsibility for the agency. Kazakhstan keeps cracking down on illegal crypto activities Kazakhstan, which became a hotspot for cryptocurrency mining and other crypto activities in the wake of a Chinese ban a few years ago, has been taking steps to regulate the space…

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Filed under: News - @ January 13, 2026 11:22 am