The Thai government, led by Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, has initiated a sweeping regulatory campaign targeting both the gold trading and cryptocurrency sectors to curb illicit capital flows and "grey money." The move follows a high-level session at the Finance Ministry involving Finance Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Ekniti Nitithanprapas and other key agencies.
The core of the strategy is the creation of a centralized national Data Bureau. This system will link transaction information across banks, bullion dealers, crypto exchanges, and regulators via Open APIs. The goal is to replace fragmented supervision with continuous, real-time monitoring to detect unusual patterns and expose how funds move between cash, gold, and crypto.
Gold trading, a massive market in Thailand, is under intense new scrutiny. The Anti-Money Laundering Office (AMLO) has been instructed to significantly lower the mandatory reporting threshold for gold bar purchases from the current 2 million baht level. This aims to combat "smurfing," where large transactions are split into smaller ones to avoid detection. The Revenue Department is also studying a new specific business tax for platforms facilitating gold trades without physical delivery.
In parallel, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has been ordered to strictly enforce the Travel Rule on cryptocurrency service providers. This rule requires them to identify both the sender and receiver in wallet-to-wallet transfers, aligning Thailand's crypto oversight with international standards to prevent digital assets from becoming an alternative laundering route.
Currency stability is a major driver behind the crackdown. Heavy gold trading volumes, often conducted in baht, have contributed to the Thai baht's strength, which gained about 10.3% in 2025. This complicates life for exporters and the tourism sector. In response, authorities are preparing limits on daily foreign currency exchanges and weighing caps on speculative gold trading. The scale of the gold market is immense, with daily volumes sometimes surpassing the stock exchange and total trading estimated at around 10 trillion baht last year.
Prime Minister Anutin framed the initiative as a holistic update to enforcement: "Today, we are not only addressing modern digital threats but also 'analogue' financial crimes. We must work as a single, integrated force to protect the public interest and the integrity of our financial system." The campaign signals a regional shift towards regulating traditional and digital markets in a unified manner to regain control over financial flows and hidden risks.
