LBank Crypto Exchange Licenses: A Clear 2026 Guide
The LBank crypto exchange is a different case from the other exchanges in this series. Coinbase, Kraken and OKX hold full licenses from major financial regulators. Its public record is thinner and more technical: two anti-money-laundering registrations, a handful of entities in several countries, older claims that third-party sites still repeat, and warnings from Japanese and Canadian regulators. Separate UAE disclosures also require careful verification. Reading that record correctly means separating what a registration is from what a license is. That distinction runs through this whole guide.
The scope is deliberate: history and licensing only. You will not find a fee table, a rating or a recommendation here.
For teams mapping business activities and jurisdiction requirements, read Sigma’s guide to blockchain consulting services. Obtain qualified legal advice for licensing decisions.
What the LBank crypto exchange is
The LBank crypto exchange is a centralized platform offering spot and futures trading, copy trading and earn products, with a very large list of listed tokens and a strong focus on newly launched and meme coins. It operates through several legal entities in different countries. The official LBank website describes its products, but product availability does not establish regulatory permission.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Founded (company’s account) | 2015 |
| CEO (as reported) | Allen Wei |
| Main operating entity named on licenses page | LBK EXCHANGE LIMITED |
| Other entities reported | LBK BLOCKCHAIN CO. LIMITED, UAB LBANK EXCHANGE (Lithuania), PT LBK TEKNOLOGY INDONESIA |
| Current registrations on official page | FinCEN MSB (US), FINTRAC MSB (Canada) |
| Japan | Public warning from the FSA, June 2024 |
The table tells most of the story. The licenses page lists registrations, not licenses, and only two of them.
For project teams, token listing services explain exchange admission and due diligence. A token listing and an exchange operating licence are separate matters.
Read more about another exchange’s regulatory history in our guide to the OKX crypto exchange.
2015 to 2017: an unclear starting date
LBank and most review sites give 2015 as the founding year. Its own introduction says it was founded that year by LBK Blockchain Co., Limited, and one profile goes further and gives December 2015. An independent check by one review site found that the domain and the company’s Twitter account were registered only in September 2017.
Both things can be true. A company can be incorporated before its public exchange goes live. For a reader, the safe statement is the narrow one: LBank says it was founded in 2015, and its public exchange presence is visible from 2017.
Early ownership has also been described in different ways. One review says the exchange was founded by a Chinese company, Superchains Network Technology, and later set up its headquarters in Hong Kong, while other profiles place its operating office in Indonesia. Readers who need the current legal structure should rely on registry records rather than reviews.
What the official licenses page lists
LBank’s official regulatory compliance page is dated 31 July 2023 and has been updated since. The version reviewed on 3 October 2026 lists two registrations under LBK EXCHANGE LIMITED. These are company-reported entries; their current status must be checked in the regulators’ registers:
| Country | Regulator | Type | Number |
|---|---|---|---|
| Canada | FINTRAC | Money Services Business registration | M22603388 |
| United States | FinCEN | Money Services Business registration | 31000328501557 |
The page itself adds that regulatory information may change and asks users to check regulators’ public records for the latest status. That advice is worth taking literally.
Registration is not a license
This is the single most important point about the LBank crypto exchange, and it is where many review sites go wrong.
FinCEN’s MSB registration framework concerns federal anti-money-laundering requirements. It is not a state money transmitter licensing regime. US money transmission licensing sits with the individual states. FinCEN MSB registration is not a crypto license in the strict legal sense and does not replace state licenses.
Canada works the same way. FINTRAC’s consumer guidance states that registration does not mean it endorses or licenses a business, only that the business has met the legal requirement to register. FINTRAC does not issue licenses or certificates of registration.
So when a site says the LBank crypto exchange is “licensed in the US and Canada,” the accurate version is narrower: one LBank entity is registered with the US and Canadian anti-money-laundering authorities. That registration brings reporting duties. It does not authorize the exchange to offer regulated services to retail customers in those countries the way a state money transmitter license, a BitLicense or a Canadian securities registration would.
Claims you will still see repeated
Third-party sites list more approvals than LBank’s own page does.
Some reviews say the LBank crypto exchange holds licenses from regulators in the United States, Canada, Italy, Australia and Lithuania. The company’s own earlier introduction referred to “NFA, MSB, and Canadian MSB” licenses.
The current official licenses page lists none of the Italian, Australian, Lithuanian or NFA items. It lists only the two MSB registrations above. Where a review and the company’s own current page disagree, the company’s page and the regulators’ registers should win. Anyone who wants to check an NFA claim can search the NFA BASIC database by exact legal name and review registration category, membership and status.
Read more about how to build a crypto brand people trust and remember. Precise descriptions of registrations and licences help readers assess a platform’s claims.
The Lithuanian entity
Lithuania deserves a separate note because of MiCA. A Lithuanian company, UAB “LBank Exchange,” was incorporated on 14 October 2022, with business objectives covering virtual currency exchange and wallet operations. Earlier reviews described it as a registered virtual asset service provider in Lithuania.
Under MiCA’s transitional rules, qualifying providers could continue under national arrangements only until the applicable deadline, no later than 1 July 2026, or until an authorisation decision, whichever came sooner. An older VASP registration does not establish current MiCA authorisation. The current licenses page does not list any EU or MiCA authorization. Before treating the LBank crypto exchange as available to EU customers under MiCA, check ESMA’s interim register of authorized crypto-asset service providers.
2024 to 2025: Japan
Japan is the clearest regulatory event in the record.
The FSA’s warning dated 14 June 2024 states that LBank Exchange conducted crypto exchange business with Japanese residents online without the required registration. The FSA also said the platform had an unknown address and an unknown representative.
The FSA then went further. In early 2025 it asked Apple and Google to remove the apps of five unregistered exchanges from their Japanese app stores: KuCoin, Bybit, Bitget, MEXC Global and LBank. Reports said the five had not met registration requirements despite earlier warnings.
Read more about jurisdiction-specific approvals and market exits in our guide to the Bybit crypto exchange.
2025: an Ontario securities warning
The Canadian Securities Administrators’ alert records an Ontario Securities Commission warning dated 27 August 2025. It identifies LBank, PT LBK Teknology Indonesia and LBK Exchange Limited and states that the platform was not registered in Ontario to engage in securities trading. This is separate from the company’s claimed FINTRAC MSB registration.
For communications teams, read Sigma’s crypto PR guide. Regulatory warnings should be reported alongside approvals with their jurisdiction and date.
2026: the UAE licence claim needs confirmation
LBank’s UAE public disclosure dated 27 February 2026 describes LBK Exchange FZE as licensed by VARA, but its licence-number and validity-date fields remain placeholders. This page alone does not establish an issued operational licence. Verify the exact entity, status and permitted activities in VARA’s public register before relying on the claim. Failure to resolve an entry here is not proof that no authorisation exists.
How this compares with a full license
It helps to set the registrations beside what a full license looks like in the other guides in this series.
A MiCA license, such as the ones Coinbase holds from Luxembourg and Kraken from Ireland, authorizes a firm to provide crypto services to retail customers across the EU, with capital, governance, conduct and disclosure rules attached. A New York BitLicense, a state money transmitter licence, a Singapore MPI licence and a Dubai VARA licence have different legal scopes. None should be assumed to authorise every exchange product or every customer category.
Read more about the legal entities and approvals behind the Coinbase crypto exchange.
An MSB registration serves a different regulatory purpose. It identifies the business to the financial intelligence authority and brings anti-money-laundering obligations; it does not certify compliance or solvency. It brings duties to report and keep records. It does not include a review of whether the business may offer trading to the public, and it does not bring the consumer protection rules that come with a full license.
That is why the honest description of this exchange’s position matters. “Registered with FinCEN and FINTRAC” is accurate. “Licensed in the US and Canada” is not, at least on the evidence in the company’s own licenses page.
For a reader comparing exchanges, the practical question is simple: in the country where you live, which entity would hold your account, and what kind of approval does that entity have? For the larger exchanges in this series, the answer is often a full local license. For LBank, the global compliance page lists the two MSB registrations. Other jurisdiction-specific claims, including the UAE disclosure, require separate verification.
LBank crypto exchange registration timeline
| Date | Jurisdiction | Regulator / source | Event | Entity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | n/a | Company’s account | Founding year given by LBank | LBK Blockchain Co., Limited |
| Sep 2017 | n/a | Independent review | Domain and Twitter account registered | n/a |
| Oct 2022 | Lithuania | Register of Legal Entities | Company incorporated | UAB LBank Exchange |
| Jul 2023 | Global | LBank | Licenses page first published | n/a |
| Company page reviewed Oct 2026 | United States | FinCEN | MSB registration 31000328501557 | LBK EXCHANGE LIMITED |
| Company page reviewed Oct 2026 | Canada | FINTRAC | MSB registration M22603388 | LBK EXCHANGE LIMITED |
| Jun 2024 | Japan | FSA | Public warning, unregistered business | LBank Exchange |
| Early 2025 | Japan | FSA | App-store removal request | LBank Exchange |
| Aug 2025 | Ontario, Canada | OSC / CSA | Warning: not registered for securities trading in Ontario | LBank and named entities |
| Feb 2026 | Dubai | Company disclosure | VARA licence claim with number and dates left blank; requires confirmation | LBK Exchange FZE |
Dates for the two MSB registrations are not shown on LBank’s page. FinCEN’s MSB Registrant Search and FINTRAC’s MSB registry show the registration and expiry details.
Reading the LBank crypto exchange record carefully
A registration is an anti-money-laundering filing, not a permission to serve retail customers. Both entries on LBank’s page are of this kind.
The company’s own current page is the starting point, not third-party reviews. Reviews still repeat older or broader claims that the official page no longer makes.
An entity is not an authorization. The existence of a Lithuanian company says nothing about whether it holds a MiCA license today.
Regulatory warnings belong in the record next to registrations. Japan’s 2024 warning and 2025 app-store request show where the exchange was operating without the registration a regulator required.
For another regulatory timeline covering approvals and enforcement, read our guide to the Binance crypto exchange.
And no registration or license removes market risk. Supervision governs how a firm behaves, not the result of a trade.
Licensing and technical assessment address different risks. Read more about crypto audit services; an audit does not establish regulatory authorisation or guarantee exchange solvency.
How to verify an LBank crypto exchange registration yourself
Use FinCEN’s MSB Registrant Search for the company-reported number 31000328501557 and FINTRAC’s MSB registry for M22603388. Consult ESMA’s MiCA registers for EU authorisation. Cross-check NFA, FSA, OSC and VARA records for the corresponding jurisdiction. Match legal names, registration numbers, status, activities and expiry dates. An unresolved licence claim remains unconfirmed.
For platforms explaining their regulatory position, Sigma’s crypto content marketing guide covers customer-facing content. Link statements to the relevant authority’s records and distinguish company claims from verified permissions.
FAQ
Is the LBank crypto exchange licensed?
The official licenses page lists two registrations, both held by LBK EXCHANGE LIMITED: a FinCEN money services business registration in the US and a FINTRAC money services business registration in Canada. These are anti-money-laundering registrations, not full operating licenses.
Is LBank regulated in the United States?
One LBank entity is registered with FinCEN as a money services business. FinCEN does not issue licenses, and MSB registration does not replace state money transmitter licenses.
Does LBank have a MiCA license?
LBank’s current licenses page lists no EU or MiCA authorization. Check ESMA’s interim MiCA register for the latest status.
Has any regulator warned about LBank?
Yes. Japan’s FSA issued a warning on 14 June 2024. The OSC also issued an Ontario securities-registration warning on 27 August 2025, recorded by the CSA. App-store removal requests were reported in early 2025.
When was the LBank crypto exchange founded?
LBank says it was founded in 2015. An independent check found its domain and Twitter account were registered in September 2017.
Does a registration make trading on LBank safe?
No. A registration covers anti-money-laundering obligations. Market, leverage and operational risk remain with the user.
Disclaimer: Financial markets, including crypto, forex, futures, derivatives and leveraged trading, involve risk. This content is for informational and strategic purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Sigma does not manage user funds, trade on behalf of users, or guarantee profits, withdrawals, listings or financial outcomes. Sigma may have commercial, partnership or referral relationships with some platforms discussed on this site; consult any applicable affiliate disclosure on this site. This article is independent, source-based research. Linked sources were reviewed on 3 October 2026. The two MSB numbers are reported by LBank; this review does not certify their current registry status. Registrations and licence permissions may change. Always confirm a registration or license on the regulator’s official register.
