Bhutan: Gelephu Gets Its Own Central Bank, Cleared to Hold Crypto in Reserves
Bhutan is giving its new special economic zone, Gelephu Mindfulness City, a central bank of its own. A Royal Decree signed by King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck turns the zone’s financial regulator into the Gelephu Central Bank, with powers to run payment systems, manage reserves and even hold digital assets such as cryptocurrencies.
Key facts
- The Royal Decree converts the Gelephu Financial Services Office into the Gelephu Central Bank, an autonomous institution with a central banking mandate. Gelephu Mindfulness City (GMC) announced the change on 2 November 2026.
- Its mandate covers monetary policy, foreign reserve management, financial stability, and setting up and supervising payment and settlement systems.
- It can provide liquidity support to financial firms, issue central bank securities and help build local money and capital markets.
- It may invest in digital assets and cryptocurrencies alongside conventional reserve assets.
- The decree opens a path for GMC to introduce its own currency, including a digital form, subject to the King’s approval. The bank is hiring for more than 50 roles.
What Gelephu is building
Gelephu Mindfulness City is a special administrative zone in southern Bhutan, on the border with India. It is designed to attract foreign investment with its own rules and institutions, separate from the rest of the country. Until now, its financial sector has been overseen by the Gelephu Financial Services Office, which licenses and supervises firms operating in the zone.
The decree upgrades that office into a full central bank for the city. In practice, that means one body will both write the rules for banks and payment firms in GMC and run the financial “plumbing” they rely on. That plumbing includes the systems that move and settle money between institutions, plus emergency lending if a bank runs short of cash.
The new bank does not replace the Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan (RMA), which remains the national central bank and the only issuer of the ngultrum, Bhutan’s currency. How the two central banks will coordinate has not yet been explained. No timetable, leadership line-up or detailed operating rules have been published so far, though Fintech News Singapore reports that David Peters is the bank’s managing director.
The new bank is recruiting Bhutanese and international staff. The roles cover virtual asset supervision, anti-money laundering, banking operations, technology risk, regulatory policy and macroeconomics.
Why it matters
Few central banks anywhere are explicitly allowed to hold cryptocurrencies as part of their reserves. Most keep reserves in foreign currencies, government bonds and gold. Gelephu’s decree allows digital assets to sit alongside those, although it does not require the bank to buy any particular token.
The move fits a wider pattern in Bhutan, which has used its hydropower to mine bitcoin through its state investment arm and has positioned GMC as a hub for digital finance. In September 2026, crypto exchange BTSE received a full licence to run an exchange and custody business in the zone.
For the region, Gelephu is a test of the “financial free zone” model, similar in spirit to Dubai’s financial centres. If GMC issues its own digital currency, it would be one of very few places in Asia where a sub-national zone has its own money. That would raise practical questions about how payments between GMC, the rest of Bhutan and neighbouring India would be converted and settled. Regulators across Asia, including those weighing stablecoin and tokenised deposit rules, will watch how a central bank with crypto reserves manages risk and price swings.
What to watch
- Who will lead the Gelephu Central Bank, and what rules it publishes for banks, payment firms and digital asset businesses.
- How it will divide responsibilities with the Royal Monetary Authority, and how money will move between GMC and the ngultrum system.
- Whether GMC goes ahead with its own currency, and whether that includes a digital version.
Related on FinDeskAsia: PayNet and the regulators and our earlier story on Sri Lanka’s central bank ruling crypto out of resident payments.
Sources: BBS, November 2026; Fintech News Singapore, November 2026; Blockhead, November 2026.
