Pakistan has announced a new regulatory framework for crypto after banning the asset class for close to a decade, with the country's leadership now directly inviting foreign businesses to set up shop within its borders.

Announcing the news in an X post on Friday, Bilal Bin Saqib, the special assistant to the prime minister on blockchain and cryptocurrency, called on companies from abroad to come to the country and establish operations. Pakistan's Virtual Assets Act introduces the country's first comprehensive legal framework for overseeing virtual assets and the businesses that operate in this space.

The Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA), the country's virtual assets regulator, marked the occasion with its own post:

8 years of prohibition end today. Chairman PVARA @BilalBinSaqib announces the notification of the Licensing Regulations and the opening of the licensing portal, and sets out what licensing requires of providers and what it guarantees consumers. Get licensed. Get compliant. Come… pic.twitter.com/STVPsoX1so

— Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (@PakistanVARA), August 21, 2026 (post)

"For approximately a decade, Pakistan's answer to virtual assets was complete permission and complete ban — but history tells us that technology never waits for permission," Bin Saqib said.

He added: "To the companies watching Pakistan from outside, the front door is open for you. Come, get licensed. Come, get banked. Come, build here under rules that are clear, public and enforceable."

In a separate post, Bin Saqib said the country now has "the rules, the regulator and the licensing framework to bring virtual assets into the formal economy, protect consumers and build the foundation for the next generation of financial infrastructure."

Pakistan's Virtual Assets Act was approved by the senate earlier this year and then signed into law by President Asif Ali Zardari. Friday's announcement indicates that the licensing regulations under the act are now in place and that the licensing portal has been opened. The setup echoes Dubai's Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), which since 2022 has licensed global exchanges and helped make the UAE a regional center for the industry.

The announcement caps a crypto-friendly pivot by Pakistan in recent years. The prohibition now being lifted dated to years of central-bank warnings and a 2018 State Bank of Pakistan circular barring banks and payment processors from handling virtual-currency transactions — the "8 years of prohibition" referenced in PVARA's post. Even under that ban, Pakistan consistently ranked among the world's leading markets for grassroots crypto adoption in Chainalysis' Global Adoption Index, so the licensing regime brings activity that was already taking place into formal oversight. The economic backdrop is sizable: overseas Pakistani workers send home more than $30 billion a year in remittances, according to central bank figures, among the country's largest sources of foreign exchange.

In 2025, plans to launch a national strategic Bitcoin reserve were announced at the Bitcoin 2025 conference. Before that, the country announced it was allocating 2,000 megawatts of surplus electricity to Bitcoin mining and AI data centers, an initiative the Pakistani government said was aimed at generating revenue, creating jobs and attracting foreign investment.

Pakistan has also played an important part as a mediator between the United States and Iran. A relationship between the two countries began forming after Pakistan became an affiliate of World Liberty Financial, the Trump-backed crypto project. Weeks after President Donald Trump's return to power last year, WLF leaders traveled to Islamabad to meet with Pakistan's prime minister.

With the licensing portal now open, the open questions are practical ones: which foreign companies seek licenses, and whether banks extend services to licensed providers after years of central-bank prohibition — the access invoked by Bin Saqib's "come, get banked" appeal.

Reporting by Mathew Di Salvo for Bitcoin Magazine.