Pakistan Announces Fresh Ban on Crypto, but Adoption as a Hedge Remains Popular

On April 30, 2023, Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper reported that banks have formally warned customers against using debit or credit cards for crypto trading. But Dawn also said that cryptocurrencies are gaining increasing popularity in the nation with the annual trading volume for Pakistan-based wallets going up to $25 billion, up from $18 billion to $20 billion a year ago, according to Zeeshan Ahmed, country general manager at Rain Financial, a Gulf-based trading platform for cryptocurrencies.