Myanmar

DeFi Intel Research Desk2026-07-14Asia

Crypto regulatory status

Framework: Buying, selling, transferring and holding cryptoassets are prohibited in the territory controlled by Myanmar's military administration. The Central Bank of Myanmar (CBM) — which asserts it is the sole entity legally authorised to issue currency — first declared digital currencies illegal in a May 2019 state-media announcement, then formalised the prohibition in Notification No. 9/2020 (May 2020), which barred digital-currency transactions (naming Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum and Perfect Money) and confirmed that no licences would be issued for such activity. The CBM reiterated the ban in a public notice on 24 May 2024 (explicitly listing BTC, ETH and USDT) and renewed the warning again on 16 November 2025.

Myanmar's crypto status is unusually contested because the country has two rival authorities. The opposition National Unity Government (NUG) — the parallel administration formed after the February 2021 military coup — recognised Tether's USDT stablecoin on 13 December 2021, with NUG finance minister Tin Tun Naing stating it would be used "for domestic use to make it easy and speed up the current trade, services and payment systems." Tether publicly welcomed the move. The recognition was an act of political defiance against the junta's ban rather than an operative legal regime: the NUG controls no central-bank infrastructure or licensed market. In practice, anyone transacting crypto inside CBM-administered territory remains exposed to enforcement.

Tax treatment

Myanmar has no cryptoasset-specific tax regime. Because digital-currency trading is illegal under CBM Notification 9/2020, there is no licensed, taxable crypto market — gains from crypto activity are not recognised or taxed as a legitimate asset class, and no capital-gains schedule for virtual assets exists. Any income realised through crypto sits outside the formal financial system and exposes the holder to anti-money-laundering enforcement rather than to a tax assessment. Specific personal or corporate treatment of incidental crypto disposals is pending verification against the Internal Revenue Department.

• Crypto-specific capital-gains rate: None — no legal crypto market exists to tax
• General crypto tax guidance: Pending verification (Internal Revenue Department)

Travel rule applicability

Status: no VASP travel-rule regime; FATF countermeasures apply. Because virtual-asset service providers are not licensed in Myanmar, there is no domestic FATF travel-rule framework governing crypto transfers. Myanmar sits on the FATF blacklist — "high-risk jurisdictions subject to a call for action" — alongside Iran and North Korea, where it was placed in October 2022 after its AML/CFT action plan (agreed February 2020) expired in September 2021 without completion. FATF urges all members to apply enhanced due diligence to Myanmar-linked flows and has signalled it will consider full countermeasures absent progress. That blacklisting shapes how foreign exchanges and correspondent banks treat any transaction with a Myanmar nexus.

Notable enforcement actions

• 2020 onward. Following Notification 9/2020, the CBM pursued legal action against individuals involved in illegal currency conversion and unauthorised "hundi" money transfers using USDT, including bank-account closures and prosecution under the Anti-Money Laundering Law and the Financial Institutions Law; penalties can include imprisonment, fines, or both.
• 16 November 2025. The CBM renewed its public warning against buying, selling, transferring or holding digital assets, citing crypto's growing role in drug trafficking, arms smuggling, human trafficking, online scams and money laundering, and pointing to international enforcement precedent.
• Scam-compound context (2025). Investigators traced nearly US$100 million in crypto deposits to two addresses linked to a Chinese front company operating in the KK Park compound in eastern Myanmar, tied to "pig-butchering" fraud and human trafficking; the on-chain analysis was run by Chainalysis, whose findings (reported by the Financial Times) identified the tracked coins as Tether's USDT, and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime has flagged USDT as a leading laundering channel in South-East Asia. Myanmar state media announced the clearing of KK Park on 21 October 2025, following a military operation launched in mid-October. (This is criminal-enterprise activity in border areas, not a sanctioned CASP operation.)

Public licensed CASP list

Not applicable. Myanmar issues no crypto-asset service-provider (CASP/VASP) licences — CBM Notification 9/2020 states that no licences will be granted for digital-currency activities, and domestic financial institutions are barred from offering crypto services. There is therefore no public register of licensed exchanges, custodians or brokers for DeFi Intel to mirror. Any platform advertising a "licensed" crypto service for Myanmar residents should be treated as unauthorised.

Comparison to neighbours

Compare Myanmar crypto regulation with three geographically adjacent jurisdictions:

Doing business in Myanmar — practical notes

Operating a cryptoasset business serving CBM-administered Myanmar is not lawful: there is no licensing pathway, banks cannot service crypto activity, and the country's FATF blacklisting means correspondent banks and foreign exchanges apply enhanced due diligence or de-risk Myanmar exposure outright. The NUG's 2021 USDT recognition does not create a usable legal regime, since the parallel government operates no financial-market infrastructure. Firms with any Myanmar nexus should treat the market as high-risk and effectively off-limits pending a change of regime and FATF de-listing. Corrections and primary-source links are welcome at [email protected].

Methodology and sources

This profile was researched and updated by DeFi Intel's research desk on 2026-07-14 from the primary and secondary sources listed below. Claims that could not be verified against a source are omitted or marked pending — we do not republish unverified third-party datasets. Submit corrections and primary-source links to [email protected].

Sources

• Tilleke & Gibbins — Myanmar's Central Bank issues further warning against crypto trading (Notification 9/2020; 24 May 2024 notice)
• Mizzima — Central Bank of Myanmar renews warning against use of cryptocurrencies (16 Nov 2025)
• Decrypt — National Unity Government of Myanmar recognises stablecoin Tether as official currency (13 Dec 2021)
• FATF — Myanmar country page (high-risk jurisdiction subject to a call for action)
• Lightspark country brief — Is crypto legal in Myanmar (2026)
• The Record (Recorded Future News) — investigators trace nearly $100M in crypto deposits to two KK Park front-company addresses (Chainalysis / IJM analysis)
• Chainalysis — Pig Butchering Gangs, Human Trafficking, and Crypto (on-chain analysis of the KK Park front-company addresses; just under $100M in inflows)
• Financial Times (via Business & Human Rights Resource Centre) — Chinese company in KK Park swindled ~$100m in cryptocurrency; Chainalysis tracked the coins as Tether/USDT
• Wikipedia — KK Park (Myanmar junta information ministry announced the compound captured and cleared on 21 October 2025, after an operation launched in mid-October)