Malaysia's enforcement playbook has always had an implicit final chapter. Bybit just became the first offshore giant to reach it.
The Securities Commission has removed Bybit and CEO Ben Zhou from its Investor Alert List, where both had sat since July 2021 for serving Malaysians without registration. Zhou announced the removal, crediting "proactive and constructive" engagement with the regulator.
How it happened
The path ran through compliance, not courtrooms. After the SC's December 2024 enforcement directives, Bybit disabled its website and apps for Malaysian users, ceased local advertising and shut its Malaysia-focused Telegram group — fully, and verifiably. Regulatory engagement did the rest.
Zhou paired the announcement with news that Bybit has led a funding round into Hata, the dual-licensed Malaysian DAX and digital broker — the same licensed-partner route Binance took via MX Global in 2022. He acknowledged that any direct return would still require registration as a Recognised Market Operator.
The precedent
Alert list → enforcement → remediation → removal → licensed-partner investment. For every offshore platform watching, the SC has now demonstrated the full arc: the perimeter is enforced, and the way back in is through it, not around it.