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Pakistan has lately accelerated efforts to integrate cryptocurrencies into its financial system, while neighboring rival India continues to take a more cautious approach, with limited progress toward comprehensive regulation.

In a notable shift, Pakistan’s central bank now allows banks to service licensed virtual asset providers, marking the end of an eight-year lull in regulated cryptocurrency activity.

Bilal Bin Saqib, Chairman of the country’s federal regulator for virtual assets, said that the country will now move from “restriction to regulation,” and “from ambiguity to institutional clarity.”

For nearly…