Kazakhstan is about to launch the first cryptocurrency, directly backed by fiat money.

According to the memorandum, EXANTE, with several successful blockchain projects already in its portfolio, will launch the Stasis platform that will serve as the foundation for the new digital asset secured by fiat. The parties also agreed to cooperate in developing the AIFC -act on the regulation of the digital assets market and support the evolution of the fintech-ecosystem of the AIFC, using EXANTE’s knowledge and experience in blockchain projects.

“Blockchain and cryptocurrencies are entering the mainstream of today’s economic reality. Astana’s leading financial regulators have already commenced their work and are laying the foundation for Kazakhstan's fitech-ecosystem. We believe that the AIFC can become an international hub for blockchain operations and the development of the digital assets market is our key priority in the near future," said the Governor of the Astana International Finance Center, Kairat Kelimbetov.

The distributed ledger technology has already drawn the attention of numerous national governments. Therefore Kazakhstan has taken proactive steps to become a global trailblazer in this field.

Gregory Klumov, Co-founder and CEO of Stasis, shares this optimistic forecast for the blockchain market. «Blockchain technology has several indisputable advantages: transparency, immutability, relatively fast transactions, and reduced cost. These factors are more than enough for a bullish tendency to come. The Global Money Supply (M2) figure is growing at 6% per year and stands at about $50 trillion currently (ex China). Digital assets market will double every two years till at least 2021. We are working on a backbone of the blockchain world, that will close the gap between emerging decentralized finance and the people».

Co-founder of EXANTE Anatoly Knyazev notes: "The development of such system will bridge the gap between the traditional asset market and the crypto-world. We see keen interest from the market players, and we already have applications from other government-related financial institutions. The expected market cap of this asset is between 2 and 3 billion in Euro-equivalent.”

Earlier, AIFC announced its intention to create a crypto-valley on the territory of EXPO-2017. The first step in establishing Astana as a crypto-valley is going to be to prepare the draft of rules and regulations regarding digital assets. The project of the legal framework is expected to be released in the the upcoming weeks.