Kazakhstan's Central Bank Signs MOU with Tether to Study Tenge Stablecoin and RWA Tokenisation
Key points
- The National Bank of Kazakhstan, Tether, and the Alatau City Authority signed an MOU on 7 October 2026 to study a tenge-pegged stablecoin and real-world asset tokenisation.
- The agreement is non-binding and exploratory; it does not commit Kazakhstan to issuing a stablecoin or adopting any specific technology.
- A tokenisation pilot is planned under Alatau City's special legal regime, with asset-class suitability to be identified as part of the workstream.
- Tether's Hadron tokenisation platform is one technology under consideration, alongside Tether's broader credentials as issuer of USDT, which has approximately $140 billion in circulation.
- NBK Deputy Governor Binur Zhalenov confirmed that the central bank intends to study international best practices in stablecoin issuance and RWA tokenisation as part of the pilot preparation.
The National Bank of Kazakhstan, Tether, and the Alatau City Authority have signed a memorandum of understanding to examine the feasibility of a stablecoin pegged to the Kazakhstani tenge, alongside broader real-world asset tokenisation use cases. The agreement is explicitly exploratory: it does not commit the central bank to issuing a stablecoin or adopting any specific technology, and the next concrete step is a study of how comparable tokens operate in other jurisdictions, followed by a proposal for a pilot.
Tokenisation sits alongside the stablecoin work as a distinct workstream. The parties will identify asset classes suitable for on-chain representation and plan a pilot within Alatau City, which operates under a special legal regime intended partly to support fintech activity. Tether’s Hadron platform, which handles issuance and management infrastructure for tokenised assets, is among the technologies under consideration, though it has not been selected. Capacity-building is also built into the arrangement, with workshops on stablecoin reserves, issuance mechanics, and tokenisation scheduled for NBK staff and other government agencies.
For operators tracking the Central Asian corridor, this MOU positions Kazakhstan as a jurisdiction actively constructing a supervised digital-asset architecture rather than leaving the field to unregulated activity. Tether brings to the table its USDT issuance experience and the Hadron infrastructure, but the more strategically interesting element is the central bank’s direct involvement at the design stage, which suggests any eventual pilot will be structured to preserve regulatory oversight. The Alatau sandbox regime is the likely proving ground to watch, since its special legal status can accommodate instruments that sit outside the standard licensing perimeter.