Kazakhstan Court Orders Curbs on Six Exchanges Including Coinbase, BingX

Kazakhstan’s financial authorities said they had secured a court injunction against six overseas exchanges for offering virtual-asset services without a license.

Cointelegraph reported on Oct. 20 that the Astana Financial Services Authority, or AFSA, the regulator under Kazakhstan’s Astana International Financial Centre, had sued the platform operators over unlicensed virtual-asset services. A court then issued the injunction, AFSA said.

The initial order, issued on Sept. 15, covered seven platforms: BingX, Bitcoin.com, Huobi Global (HTX), BitMart, Coinbase, LBank and WEEX. LBank was removed from the order three days later after voluntarily blocking access in Kazakhstan. Google and Apple were also included in the regional access restrictions as app store operators.

AFSA said users of unlicensed platforms lack the safeguards required of licensed firms, including asset protection, disclosure, complaint handling and dispute resolution.

“The court’s decision is the result of the AFSA supervision and enforcement team’s continued efforts to regulate platforms that have advertised and provided virtual-asset services in Kazakhstan without the required license,” AFSA Chief Executive Officer Evgeniya Bogdanova said.

AFSA said it had given advance notice of AIFC rules to more than 20 platforms during 2025. Of those, nine voluntarily restricted app access and seven expressed an intention to obtain a license. AFSA withdrew its lawsuits against the nine that took voluntary action and said it would maintain the injunctions against the remaining six.