Tether said Wednesday it has signed a memorandum of understanding with the National Bank of Kazakhstan and the Alatau City Authority to explore a tenge-pegged stablecoin and tokenized assets.
A tenge stablecoin is the first item in the agreement
According to the announcement, the first goal under the memorandum is a stablecoin tied to the tenge, Kazakhstan’s national currency. The three parties will study how such products are issued in other countries and then prepare a concept and pilot proposal.
The announcement did not specify who would issue the token.
Asset tokenization pilot planned for Alatau
On tokenization, the parties said they will identify priority asset categories, design a model and launch a pilot in Alatau. That pilot could run on Hadron, the tokenization platform Tether launched in November 2024.
No date was given for the stablecoin pilot or the tokenization pilot.
The memorandum is a written statement of what the parties intend to explore together, rather than a binding contract.
The agreement also includes workshops for National Bank of Kazakhstan staff covering token issuance, reserve management and asset tokenization.
Alatau is being built as a fintech hub
Alatau is a planned smart city in the Almaty region. It is being built from scratch, has its own legal regime and has been pitched as a fintech hub for Central Asia. The project is valued at $7.2 billion and aims to expand from 52,000 residents to 2 million.
The report also said President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev wants people in the city to pay for goods and services with cryptocurrency.
Kazakhstan has already earmarked funds for crypto-related investment
In March, the central bank set aside as much as $350 million for crypto-related investments from nearly $70 billion in gold and foreign exchange reserves. The money may go into shares of crypto-linked companies and index funds rather than directly into coins.
Officials said in September that the national crypto reserve had reached $700 million, with about $200 million invested so far, mostly through hedge funds, described in the report as private pools that trade on behalf of large investors.
The country already has another tenge stablecoin pilot
Kazakhstan is already running a separate tenge stablecoin pilot called Evo. It was launched in September 2025 inside the central bank’s regulatory sandbox and was issued by exchange Intebix and Eurasian Bank, with support from Solana and Mastercard.
Under that arrangement, the National Bank of Kazakhstan writes the rules of the test but does not issue the token.
Separate property tokenization plan targets end-2026
The National Bank also has a separate plan to tokenize two Alatau properties worth up to $50 million and $10 million. That work is due by the end of 2026 on the Kazakhstan Stock Exchange’s infrastructure.