A few things happening across Asia’s crypto regulatory front this week.
Singapore’s central bank added decentralized exchange Hyperliquid to its Investor Alert List on Friday. The list isn’t a ban — it flags entities that might be mistaken for licensed or regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore. Bybit, KuCoin, and Bitget are already on it. Hyperliquid responded by saying it’s never claimed to be MAS-authorized and that nothing about its permissionless infrastructure has changed.
Meanwhile, Indonesia is taking a different approach. The country’s financial regulator rolled out certification requirements for influencers who promote crypto and digital financial assets. Under the new rules, finfluencers need competency certifications unless they’re already covered by separate licensing. They can only recommend assets listed on authorized exchanges, and any service provider they promote must be licensed. Marketing has to go through regulated financial services businesses.
Indonesia isn’t alone here. Australia and the UK have introduced broader rules for investment promotions, and the Philippines adopted crypto-specific marketing restrictions.
In South Korea, Bithumb was fined $136,000 for sending user data overseas without proper consent. The exchange had been sharing its Tether order books with BingX between September and November 2025, along with user information with 13 overseas exchanges. That’s a clear breach of the country’s personal information protection rules.
And in Japan, SBI Holdings is acquiring full control of Bitbank in a $289 million deal. The combined entity would hold about 1.1 trillion yen in custody assets across roughly 2.92 million crypto accounts — making it Japan’s biggest crypto exchange. The deal is expected to close around October, pending regulatory approval.
