Vietnam to Issue First Batch of Crypto Service Licenses in 2026
Vietnam plans to issue the first batch of licenses for crypto asset service providers in 2026 under a pilot legal framework, allowing the first digital asset platforms to commence operations. Vu Thi Chan Phuong, chair of the National Securities Commission, stated that the regulatory mechanism will reference FATF recommendations and the EU model, covering transactions between service providers and investors, with a focus on risk management, investor asset protection, and anti-money laundering.
Deputy Finance Minister Nguyen Duc Chi met with Mariana Kuhnel, Executive Director of the Austrian Financial Market Authority, in Vienna to discuss bilateral regulatory cooperation and experience exchange. Kuhnel proposed holding an online technical seminar and enhancing coordination through the International Organization of Securities Commissions. The Vietnamese delegation included the ambassador to Austria, members of the securities commission, exchanges, and central securities depository personnel. The pilot is based on government resolution No. 05/2025/NQ-CP, in conjunction with the Digital Technology Industry Law, with a pilot period of about five years.
The licensing threshold excludes most participants: applicants must be registered companies in Vietnam with a minimum paid-in capital of approximately 100 trillion VND, equivalent to about 38 to 40 million USD; foreign ownership is capped at 49%, and no entity can hold stakes in multiple service providers; at least 35% of the equity must be held by two financial institutions; issuance, trading, and settlement must be conducted in VND. The Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Public Security, and the State Bank will jointly review applications, with the securities commission receiving and coordinating submissions. Applications will be accepted starting January 20, 2026.
There is already a queue in the market. A document from the Ministry of Finance reported by Reuters shows that five entities have passed the preliminary review, including Techcombank, VPBank, LPBank affiliates, broker VIX Securities, and consortium Sun Group. The draft from the Ministry of Finance also requires that any stake reaching 1% of the paid-in capital must be reported three days in advance; transactions involving directors, supervisors, and technical heads must also be reported three days in advance; platforms must submit custody data to the securities commission weekly and provide audited client asset reports biannually, including wallet addresses, balances, hot and cold wallet statuses, and reserve proofs.
The demand base is already substantial. GWI statistics indicate that about 9.2 million Vietnamese hold crypto assets, accounting for 18.5% of internet users. Chainalysis ranked Vietnam fourth in its latest global adoption index, with on-chain activities involving Vietnamese traders exceeding 200 billion USD in the 12 months ending June of that year. Since June 2023, Vietnam has been on the FATF gray list, with multiple deadlines for action plans having passed; the licenses are intended to fill the regulatory gap for virtual asset service providers.
Who is buying and who is selling: Buyers are local financial groups that can meet capital requirements, bank shareholders, and compliant systems, while sellers are unlicensed foreign platforms capturing Vietnamese retail traffic. The event is driven by the pilot opening and pressure from the gray list, with funds shifting from peer-to-peer and overseas accounts to licensed custody and VND settlement channels. Beneficiaries include compliant banks, brokerages, and large consortiums, while those under pressure are undercapitalized startup exchanges and domestic investors still trading on foreign platforms six months after the first licenses are issued.
Supplementary data shows that publicly available reports have not listed the names of exchanges that have officially obtained licenses, nor provided the first batch of trading pairs or initial market-making scale; currently verifiable information includes the opening of the application window and the establishment of hard thresholds for capital and equity structure, while on-chain trading remains primarily on international platforms rather than local licensed ledgers.
Source: Public Information
ABAB AI Insight
Vietnam has long treated crypto as a gray retail market: transactions occur on foreign platforms like Binance and Bybit, with local banks only facilitating fiat currency at both ends. After being placed on the FATF gray list in 2023, the gap shifted from "is there currency" to "is there an accountable virtual asset service provider." The securities commission has established a dedicated regulatory department for the crypto asset market, effectively bringing this business from an unregulated state into the securities regulatory framework, rather than leaving it solely to the central bank for payment oversight.
The capital pathway is designed as "bank equity + high paid-in capital + foreign capital dilution." The 100 trillion VND threshold is several times higher than the capital requirements for licenses in Hong Kong and Singapore, serving not to encourage startup exchanges but to compel institutions like Techcombank and VPBank, which already have anti-money laundering and custody capabilities, to move off-balance-sheet traffic onto the balance sheet. The 49% foreign ownership cap and the requirement for "two financial institutions to hold a total of 35%" are intended to retain pricing power and client assets within the domestic clearing chain, while also providing the FATF gray list review with insights from the Austrian FMA and EU MiCA experience.
Similar structures have occurred: South Korea shifted from foreign platforms to local licensed exchanges linked to real-name bank accounts; India used tax and payment restrictions to push retail into regulated channels; Hong Kong confined retail trading to licensed platforms. Vietnam is in a control phase rather than an expansion phase—first locking in about five pilot licenses before discussing product innovation. The inclusion of Sun Group alongside banks indicates that licenses are viewed as financial infrastructure permits rather than software licenses for tech companies.
The structural judgment reflects capital concentration driven by regulatory changes. The mechanism is: the larger the unlicensed market and the harder it is to measure cross-border outflows, the more regulators tend to use capital and shareholder qualifications as filters; once the filter is established, traffic, custody fees, and listing rights concentrate in a few local groups capable of writing checks. Technological substitution occurs at the settlement level—from foreign stablecoin accounts to VND legal settlement; pricing power shifts partially from global platform order books to licensed local exchanges.
ABAB News · Cognitive Law
Gray list spurs licenses, licenses spur oligopoly
High capital thresholds are not safety nets, but auction tickets for entry
First gather traffic into the cage, then discuss market opening