Is Crypto Legal in Pakistan? What the Virtual Assets Act Says
Pakistan has had a crypto law in force since March 2026, but no exchange holds a licence yet — here is what is settled, and what PVARA has not answered.
Key takeaways
- The Virtual Assets Act, 2026 has been in force since March 2026; holding crypto in Pakistan is not banned.
- The Act binds businesses, not individual holders. It creates no new obligation for a person with a wallet.
- As of 18 September 2026, PVARA has licensed no exchange. Binance and HTX hold NOCs, which are not licences.
- The six-month deadline for existing operators to apply or stop has passed; PVARA has published no count of applicants.
The Virtual Assets Act, 2026 received presidential assent on 4 March 2026 and was published in the Gazette of Pakistan Extraordinary on 5 March 2026 — Act No. XIII of 2026, No.F.22(34)2025-Legis. (Gazette of Pakistan, Extraordinary, Part I, 5 March 2026, na.gov.pk). Section 1(3) brings it into force "at once." That makes crypto legal in Pakistan in the sense that holding it is not banned and a licensing regime now exists in law. It does not mean any exchange is licensed, and it does not mean an individual holder has any new obligation.
What this means for Pakistani users
If you hold crypto in Karachi or Lahore, the Act does not touch you directly. Section 2(1) binds Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) and Issuers — the businesses, not the person holding a wallet. What changes for an ordinary reader is indirect: which exchanges can legally operate here, and on what terms, is now being decided under this law rather than in a regulatory vacuum.
Two implementing regulations were notified on 21 August 2026 and are in force, not consultation drafts: the Pakistan Virtual Asset Services Regulations, 2026, S.R.O. 1419(I)/2026 (pvara.gov.pk), and the Pakistan Virtual Asset Services Activity Specific Regulations, 2026, S.R.O. 1420(I)/2026 (pvara.gov.pk). The second sets conduct rules by category — Advisory, Exchange (including margin, leverage, market disruption and suspension/delisting), Management/Investment, and Mining. It is a rulebook for how a licensed business must behave once licensed, not a gate that itself grants licences.
No licence exists yet
As of 18 September 2026, PVARA has not granted a Virtual Asset Service Provider licence to anyone. The regulator's own licensing page (pvara.gov.pk/licensing, fetched 18 September 2026) tells applicants they "will need to meet the following requirements to obtain a VASP license when full licensing becomes available" — full licensing is still a future state, not a live category. Binance and HTX hold No Objection Certificates (NOCs) from PVARA — confirmed via PVARA's own news page (fetched 18 September 2026), whose latest item, dated 12 December 2025, announces the NOC grant, not a licence. An NOC is a step towards a licence, not a licence: regulation 6(4) of the Services Regulations says an NOC "does not constitute a Licence or authorization to carry on any Virtual Asset Service."
The Act also requires PVARA, under section 21(4), to publish a register of licensees. No such register exists anywhere on pvara.gov.pk as of 18 September 2026. CryptoPakistan's PVARA licence tracker follows each firm's status in the meantime.
The six-month deadline has already passed
Section 70(1) of the Act requires anyone who was providing virtual asset services before the Act commenced to apply for a licence — or stop operating — within six months of commencement. As CryptoPakistan reported ahead of the deadline, PVARA's own licensing page resolves the operative commencement date as 5 March 2026 — the gazette publication date, not the 4 March assent date — telling operators who were "operating since March 5, 2026 or before" to submit an NOC application "by September 5, 2026, or cease operations, as required under Section 70." That makes 5 September 2026 the deadline PVARA itself is applying, even though the Act's plain text would also support 4 September 2026 from the assent date; PVARA has not separately clarified the discrepancy. Either date has now passed, and PVARA has not published any count of applicants or of businesses that ceased operating as a result.
Where the old NOC rules stand
PVARA's regulations page (fetched 18 September 2026) still lists the NOC Regulations, 2025, captioned "Applicable until the promulgation of services and activity regulations." Both sets of regulations were promulgated on 21 August 2026, so on the regulator's own caption the 2025 rules have run their course. The same entry now tells readers that "All applicants of NOC, whether transitional or other, should submit NOC application under Pakistan Virtual Asset Services Regulations."
The Services Regulations write the handover down. Regulation 7(7), headed "NOC Regulation 2025 transition", lets a firm already holding an NOC under the 2025 rules apply directly for a licence, and spares applicants already in correspondence with PVARA under those rules from filing a fresh NOC application. What the regulations do not contain is a formal repeal of the 2025 rules, and PVARA has published no statement on how conditions attached to NOCs granted under them carry over.
That gap matters for the firms that already hold NOCs, including Binance and HTX: it decides when they must apply for a full licence. On CryptoPakistan's reading of the 2025 rules, that date falls around 21 November 2026. PVARA has not confirmed it, and we will report on it separately.
What we're watching
No licensing timetable has been published. PVARA has not said when it will begin issuing VASP licences, has not published the section 21(4) register, and has not said how NOCs granted under the 2025 rules carry into the new regime. Readers should treat "crypto is legal" as accurate for holding, and treat "an exchange is licensed" as false until PVARA's own licensing page shows otherwise.
Sources
- Gazette of Pakistan, Extraordinary, Part I, 5 March 2026, No.F.22(34)2025-Legis., Act No. XIII of 2026 (Virtual Assets Act, 2026): na.gov.pk
- Pakistan Virtual Asset Services Regulations, 2026 — S.R.O. 1419(I)/2026, notified 21 August 2026, regulations 6(4) and 7(7): pvara.gov.pk
- Pakistan Virtual Asset Services Activity Specific Regulations, 2026 — S.R.O. 1420(I)/2026, notified 21 August 2026: pvara.gov.pk
- PVARA, Licensing, fetched 18 September 2026
- PVARA, News & Updates, fetched 18 September 2026
- PVARA, Regulatory Documents, fetched 18 September 2026
- CryptoPakistan, "PVARA licence deadline hits 5 September 2026"
