Key Takeaways
- Pakistan calls for international collaboration on digital assets.
- Minister Bin Saqib highlights risks and opportunities of digital finance.
- Regulation should evolve with technology to avoid market risks.
Pakistan has called for stronger global cooperation to develop regulatory and institutional frameworks for digital assets, warning that countries must either shape the future of finance or risk being shaped by it.
Minister of State and Chairman of the Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA) Bilal Bin Saqib made these remarks during a session at the United Nations Headquarters, emphasizing the importance of international collaboration.
The session, convened by the Permanent Mission of Pakistan to the United Nations, brought together member states, UN entities, and private-sector stakeholders to discuss digital assets and blockchain for sustainable development.
Bin Saqib highlighted the potential of digital assets, tokenisation, and distributed ledger technologies to offer emerging economies an opportunity to rethink financial infrastructure around inclusion, efficiency, and access.
He noted that around 1.4 billion adults remain outside the formal financial system, while billions more face high costs and limited access to credit, emphasizing the need for innovation to address these challenges.
The minister pointed out that the average cost of sending USD200 across borders remains more than twice the 3 percent target set under Sustainable Development Goal 10.c, arguing that closing this gap could return billions of dollars annually to families.
Bin Saqib also highlighted the potential of digital finance beyond payments and remittances, mentioning digital identity and verifiable financial histories that could enable small businesses, farmers, and women entrepreneurs to demonstrate economic activity.
Tokenisation could help mobilise capital by fractionalising assets ranging from infrastructure bonds to renewable energy projects, while distributed ledger technology could enhance transparency in public expenditure and supply chains.
However, Bin Saqib cautioned that technology should not be viewed as an automatic solution to development challenges, identifying risks including retail market volatility, illicit finance, and the growing regulatory divide between countries.
He stressed that the choice before every Member State is not to regulate or not to regulate, but to govern the future, or be governed by it, urging member states to turn the UN briefing into the beginning of deeper international cooperation.
The question before this room is not whether these technologies will scale. They will. The question is: who will shape them, and in whose interest.
Bilal Bin Saqib, Minister of State and Chairman of the Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA)
No nation rises alone, and no nation should be left to rise alone.
Bilal Bin Saqib, Minister of State and Chairman of the Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA)
