Key Takeaways
- The government is reviewing which companies meet their criteria to become part of the exchange.
- Over the next two years, the crypto oversight will be taken from Bappebti by the Financial Services Authority (FSA).
Indonesia’s Ministry of Trade has reportedly announced its plans to launch a national crypto exchange by June 2023. Making the announcement at the opening of Crypto Literacy Month in Jakarta, the country’s Trade Minister Zulkifli Hasan stated that the government is reviewing which companies meet its criteria to become part of the exchange.
Earlier this year, the head of the Commodity Futures Trading Regulatory Agency of Indonesia (Bappebti), Didid Noordiatmoko, stated that a crypto exchange should be set up this year. The move comes as a part of broader financial reform launched in December 2022. As part of the reform, over the next two years, the crypto oversight will be taken from Bappebti, a commodities-focused agency, by the Financial Services Authority (FSA).
Reasoning the need for change in crypto oversight, Suminto Sastrosuwito, a head of Financing and Risk Management of the national finance ministry, had earlier stated, “In fact, crypto assets have become an investment and financial instruments, so they need to be regulated on an equal basis with other financial and investment instruments.”
Urging people to be more patient with the crypto exchange launch, Hasan stated, “Let us not rush because if it is not ready, things will get messy. The government does not want this to massively take a toll on the public because people do not know much about crypto trading.”
Hasan notes that there exist around five active crypto exchanges which are at present registered with the country’s regulators, adding that the ministry’s crypto exchange could encompass all of them. Last year in December, the Bank of Indonesia’s Governor Perry Warjiyo had announced that a central bank digital currency(CBDC) it was planning to launch would become the only legal digital tender in the nation.
The Indonesian government has always taken a mixed stance on crypto regulation. Despite putting a blanket ban on crypto payments back in 2017, local authorities have preferred to keep crypto trading legal.
According to available data, around 16 million cryptocurrency investors were present in Indonesia in the first eleven months of 2022, an increase from 11.2 million at the end of 2021. In 2022, however, the trading value dropped to around 300 trillion rupiah ($19.2 billion) from 859 trillion rupiah ($54.9 billion) a year earlier.
