Turkish Regulators Declare War on DeFi: PancakeSwap Out, What’s Next?

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After PancakeSwap’s recent beheading by Turkish authorities, DeFi services everywhere shiver with existential dread. There’s talk among the gray-faced lords—regulators, they call themselves—that other wallets and DEXs might soon join the great digital soup kitchen line, grimacing bravely in the shadows.

The spectacle unfolded at Istanbul Blockchain Week, where bureaucrats, suited and stoic, gathered like crows on a carcass to softly mutter the end of decentralized exchange freedoms. A transcript landed on my desk—anonymous, no doubt shaken loose by a trembling desk clerk—detailing the new plan. Let’s call it what it is: DeFi is to be herded into the same lifeless barn as the centralized lot. Fill out your forms, ye free-spirited protocols, or taste the cold shoulder of banishment.

But don’t think every DeFi whisperer is thrown out into the street. Ali İhsan Güngör, the Capital Markets Board’s right hand, in a tone forged by state dinners and boredom, explained: “You may live free, Turkish souls, and choose services abroad—as long as nobody dares to market to you, waving banners and shaking coins. Should any decentralized entity flap its banner towards Turkey—ah, regulation’s hammer awaits.”

“A Turkish citizen can, entirely of their own free will, receive services from another institution abroad, as capital movements are already free,” Güngör pronounced, perhaps dreaming of a freer world. “However, if institutions or entities providing DeFi services direct their activities towards Turkey, through widespread promotion, advertising, or marketing, then they become subject to our regulations.” Alas, it’s all fun and games until the advertisements arrive, isn’t it? 🎭

Turkey bans PancakeSwap for promotions to its citizens

Güngör, with an air of one delivering breadline tickets, announced: “We have already started to impose access blocks on such websites.” Tremble, oh ye 46 websites, blocked on the historic day of July 4. Turkey’s firewall is now higher than ever—not a pancake shall flip without permission!

Internet service providers lined up, clicking gleefully, to block PancakeSwap’s domain. Mobile apps and even social media accounts, innocent as newborn lambs, have been rounded up in the same dragnet. Somehow, nobody really knows how these services reached Turkish users—perhaps by carrier pigeon, perhaps by Wi-Fi carried in the Anatolian breeze. 🤷‍♂️

PancakeSwap, proud descendent of Satoshi’s libertarian fever dream, has no Turkish branch. No nice office, no tastelessly furnished legal entity. In-state licensing? Ha! They’ll have better luck squeezing pancakes from a stone. 🥞

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2025-07-08 22:38