The Block reported that Bitstamp, an established cryptocurrency exchange that has been in operation for more than 12 years, announced that it will stop providing services to Canadian users in January next year. This is the latest major exchange to announce its withdrawal from the Canadian market, following Binance, Bybit and OKX.

Bitstamp withdraws from Canadian market

Bitstamp issued a statement to The Block saying that the company is exiting the Canadian market.

The content shows that after successively notifying its users in March this year, Bitstamp will officially stop providing services to Canadian users on January 8, 2024. All Canadian accounts will be deactivated at that time and users must withdraw funds before then.

Bobby Zagotta, Bitstamp’s U.S. CEO and global chief business officer, revealed:

This was not a decision we took lightly, and we thank our Canadian customers for their loyalty to us over the years and hope we will have the opportunity to serve Canada again in the future.

Previously, Bitstamp was under pressure from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in August this year, citing the U.S. regulatory environment and industry development and delisting some of the altcoins that were mentioned or accused of being securities.

At the same time, it has launched a financing process as early as June this year to raise funds for global expansion. It is said that Bitstamp will use this to launch derivatives trading in Europe next year, expand its service content in the United Kingdom, and expand its business scale in the Asian market.

Canadian authorities tighten regulations

Earlier this year, the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) gave cryptocurrency exchanges until the end of March to register and meet requirements.

As soon as the news came out, many large encryption companies, including Binance, Bybit, OKX, Deribit, Paxos, and dydx, left the Canadian market within a year.

(Review of CSA registration specifications: Canada tightens encryption regulations, major mainstream exchanges leave, Coinbase and Crypto.com stay alone)

It is worth mentioning that the exchange Coinbase expressed its approval of the country’s regulatory actions and expressed that it likes Canada’s friendly approach to regulation through participation.

However, its original high-intensity regulatory attitude seems to have changed recently. Just last week, CSA announced that it would conditionally open stablecoin trading, as long as the service issuers and exchanges comply with the terms related to asset reserves, governance and operations, and submit application documents to them before December this year, pending approval That’s it.

However, CSA also emphasized:

Even if an asset meets these specifications, it should not be regarded as an absolute endorsement of the asset, let alone an indication that the asset is free of risks.

This article Large exchanges are leaving one after another! Bitstamp will exit the Canadian market next year first appeared on Chain News ABMedia.