Crypto Balance Reset After a Freeze: Istanbul Appeal Court Ruling

During a prosecutor's investigation, a company's account on a crypto asset platform was frozen, and the investigation, which lasted almost two years, ended with a decision of non-prosecution. When the freeze was lifted and the account became accessible again, the company found that two different crypto assets, which it believed had been reported to the prosecutor's office during the investigation, had been reset to zero, and that the same number of units of another asset, never held in the account before, had been added in their place. For these assets, valued at roughly TRY 262 million in Turkish lira terms by the company's own calculation, the company sought a precautionary attachment (freezing order) against the platform operator. The dispute raises a concrete question: with which documents must a crypto asset claim be proven "approximately" at the precautionary attachment stage?

In its decision of 25.09.2025, Docket No. (E.) 2025/1630, Decision No. (K.) 2025/1501, the 13th Civil Chamber of the Istanbul Regional Court of Appeal stated that the party making the request must put strong evidence of the existence of the claim into the case file, and that the court has no duty to carry out its own search for evidence at this stage. It dismissed the appeal on the merits by unanimous vote, and the refusal of the precautionary attachment became final.

🔐 The corporate account, the freeze and the changed balance

According to the facts set out in the decision, the requesting company opened a corporate account on 11.03.2022, using an e-mail address, with the other company, which operates a crypto asset trading platform, and deposited crypto assets of different types and amounts into it. Later, within a prosecutor's investigation opened against the company, all of its balances at banks and crypto platforms were frozen on 15.11.2022.

During the investigation, the prosecutor's office asked the platform for the account balance. According to the requesting company, the platform stated in a letter dated 01.12.2022 that the company's account held 1,798,393 units of one crypto asset and 500 units of another. The names of the assets are anonymised in the decision.

The investigation ended on 30.09.2024 with a decision of non-prosecution, and the prosecutor's office sent written instructions to the relevant financial institutions to lift the freezes. According to the company, the banks and another crypto platform restored access on 16.10.2024, while the other side did not lift the freeze immediately. Access was obtained after a notice sent through a notary, but when the account was checked, the balances of the two assets were zero, and 1,798,393 units of a third crypto asset, not previously held in the account, had been added instead.

The company sent notices dated 16.10.2024, 17.10.2024, 09.12.2024 and 22.01.2025; in the last one it demanded payment of TRY 261,995,683, which it had calculated as the Turkish lira value of the two assets on 22.01.2025. In its reply notices of 17.12.2024 and 05.02.2025, the platform stated that the amount in the notice and the type and quantity of the crypto assets did not reflect reality, and that the allegations were abstract.

📑 The grounds for the precautionary attachment request

The company asked for the platform's movable and immovable property, and its rights and receivables held by third parties, to be attached as a precaution up to TRY 261,995,683. The main arguments raised in the petition and at the appeal stage were as follows:

🏛️ The commercial court's reasons for refusal

The Istanbul 9th Commercial Court of First Instance rejected the request in its decision of 26.06.2025 (Misc. No. 2025/1504, Decision No. 2025/1513). The court recalled that, under Article 257/1 of the Enforcement and Bankruptcy Law (İİK), a precautionary attachment requires a money claim that is due and not secured by a pledge, and that, under Article 258/1, the creditor must present evidence that persuades the court.

The main points in the court's assessment were as follows:

• Being satisfied with approximate proof does not mean that the rules of evidence can be set aside altogether.
• In its reply notices the other side did not accept the type and amount of the assets; there is therefore no admission of the requesting company's claims.
• Whether a claim exists, its amount if it does, and whether the conditions of the request are met can be determined only by collecting evidence in the main lawsuit to be filed.
• For a claim whose existence is disputed and still has to be established, one cannot speak of a money claim that is due or has a fixed due date.
• No evidence was submitted showing that the other side was trying to remove or hide its assets.

⚖️ The regional court of appeal's assessment

In the appeal review, the Chamber characterised the request as a precautionary attachment request "based on the allegation that the type and amount of the crypto assets deposited in the account held with the other side had been changed by it and some had been reset to zero". It then cited Articles 257/1 and 258 of the İİK and stressed that the standard required here is approximate proof.

The decisive part of the ruling concerns the prosecutor's letter, which the requesting company relied on as its strongest evidence. On the case file, the Chamber made the following findings:

For these reasons, the Chamber concluded that no evidence capable of approximate proof had been submitted for the existence of a due claim of TRY 261,995,683, not secured by a pledge, said to correspond to the crypto assets. It found no procedural or legal error in the first-instance court's refusal, which was based on an assessment of the evidence and gave its reasons, and dismissed the appeal on the merits under Article 353/1-b-1 of the Code of Civil Procedure (HMK). The decision was given as final under Article 362/1-f of the HMK. Article 258/3 of the İİK also provides that the decision of the regional court of appeal on an appeal against the refusal of a precautionary attachment request is final.

🔎 How did the approximate proof standard work for crypto assets?

A precautionary attachment is the temporary seizure of a debtor's property by court order in order to secure the creditor's money claim. Full proof is not required at this stage; but, as the decision shows, "approximate proof" is not an arbitrary impression, it is an assessment based on the documents placed in the file.

In this case the requesting company's argument had two links: first, that the platform had reported a certain amount of crypto assets to an official authority during the investigation; second, that these assets were reset while the freeze was in place. Once the first link could not be proven, the second was left without support. The Chamber did not treat mentioning the evidence in the petition as sufficient; it based its decision on the fact that the attachment to the letter was not in the file and that the existing content did not contain the alleged figures.

Another notable aspect of the ruling for crypto asset disputes is the nature of the claim. A precautionary attachment can be requested for a money claim. The requesting company described its claim as a money claim by calculating the Turkish lira value of the crypto assets on the date of the notice. However, the first-instance court noted that, while the type and amount of the assets were in dispute, this value was also disputed and needed to be established. Because the regional court of appeal found that there was no approximate proof of the existence of the claim, it did not separately examine, in legal terms, the conversion of a crypto asset into a money claim.

Despite the requesting company's view that "the debt was not denied", the first-instance court treated the reply notices as an objection, not as an admission.

🧭 Takeaways from the ruling

• The evidence must be in the file: In a precautionary attachment review, the court is not obliged to obtain the document the requesting party relies on; the document and its attachments depend on what the requesting party submits.
• The content must match the claim: Relying on an official letter is not enough; the content of the letter must show the alleged amount and type.
• A decision of non-prosecution does not prove everything: The end of the investigation allows the freeze to be lifted; but if the decision contains no finding about the assets in the account, its contribution to proving the claim remains limited.
• A disputed amount: For an asset whose value changes with the exchange rate, and whose type and amount the other side disputes, the calculated lira value was regarded by the first-instance court as a claim that needed to be established.
• Finality: The decision of the regional court of appeal on an appeal against the refusal of a precautionary attachment request is final; the underlying claim, however, may be argued in a separate lawsuit.

The decision does not rule on whether the crypto asset was in fact reset or whether the platform is liable; it only assesses the burden of proof at the stage of temporary legal protection. For a different dispute in which a financial crimes (MASAK) freeze on a crypto account was considered in relation to a precautionary attachment, see the article on a MASAK freeze on crypto; for the discussion of a precautionary attachment based on a promissory note taken after a crypto loss, see the article on a promissory note obtained by pressure after a crypto lossTR.

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