The Astana Financial Services Authority adopted a comprehensive framework for providing money services in the Astana International Financial Centre, introducing new AIFC Rules on Providing Money Services and making consequential amendments to the AIFC General Rules, AIFC Glossary, AIFC Conduct of Business Rules, AIFC Banking Business Prudential Rules, and AIFC Rules on Digital Asset Activities. The framework consolidates existing requirements into a single rulebook for a growing market of AIFC Participants providing money services, including the ten currently authorised Money Service Providers. The revised list of regulated money services now covers arranging currency exchange, providing or operating payment accounts, acquiring payment transactions, payment initiation services, and account information services, while also clarifying activities outside the regulatory perimeter, including certain technical support services, liquidity transactions between digital asset service providers (including foreign providers), and user-initiated transfers of digital assets between a user’s own accounts. The framework also specifies that AFSA will regulate payment transactions using digital assets where they function like traditional money services (including digital asset remittances and acquiring) and will cover non-custodial service providers with business models similar to payment initiation services; it introduces a bridge model and a direct model for how Money Service Providers can handle digital assets. Client protection provisions include mandatory disclosures in client agreements, refund provisions, liability rules for unauthorised transactions, and rights of recourse, alongside requirements on cyber resilience. The new rules enter into force in two phases: provisions related to definitions, capital requirements and the use of digital assets in money services from 13 October 2025, and provisions on client protection and cyber resilience from 13 January 2026.

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