Indonesia Pushes On-Chain Economy with Regulatory Overhaul

Indonesia's Financial Services Authority (OJK) is making strides to establish the country as an on-chain economy, moving beyond crypto trading and deeper into its national financial system. According to OJK's Chief Executive for Financial Sector Technology Innovation, Digital Financial Assets and Crypto Assets Supervision Adi Budiarso, the 'on-chain economy' is coming.

Budiarso outlined the direction during a keynote at Coinfest Asia 2026, saying that blockchain technology is increasingly being used not only for investment but also for transactions, decentralized finance (DeFi), stablecoins, and asset tokenization. He noted that crypto assets are no longer merely speculative investment instruments but have become an engine and rail for DeFi transactions.

OJK recorded 22.69 million crypto asset consumers as of June 2026, up from 22.40 million a month earlier, while transaction value reached IDR 28.58 trillion, rising 24.2% from May. The market infrastructure has also continued to develop with 26 licensed digital financial asset traders, two exchanges, two clearing institutions, and two custodians operating in the ecosystem.

OJK is advancing four priorities for the country's digital asset sector: strengthening the regulatory status of crypto asset service providers, restructuring trading infrastructure and investor identification, setting rules for stablecoins, and finalizing regulations for real-world asset (RWA) tokenization. The authority plans to recognize crypto asset service providers as part of the financial services industry, bringing governance standards closer to those applied to conventional financial institutions.

OJK is also preparing a Single Investor Identification (SID) system for crypto investors, aligning the sector with capital market standards. Stablecoins will be treated as transactional instruments, not payment tools, while RWA tokenization could help expand access to capital for small and medium-sized enterprises.