Crypto Platform KYC Dispute: İzmir Appeal Court Ruling 2026

A crypto asset platform asks a user who has been trading for years for new identity documents, family details and even statements about their assets. When the documents are not supplied, the account still looks “open”, but the balance can no longer be withdrawn. The user starts enforcement proceedings, the platform objects, and the dispute turns into an objection annulment action. Which court hears such a case: the consumer court or the commercial court of first instance? Does Law No. 7518, which brought crypto assets under the Capital Markets Law, affect that question? The 17th Civil Chamber of the İzmir Regional Court of Appeal answered these questions in a case brought against a platform.

By its decision of 30.06.2026, Docket No. (E.) 2025/1321, Decision No. (K.) 2026/1609, the 17th Civil Chamber of the İzmir Regional Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal of the defendant platform, a crypto asset service provider, which was based on an objection to jurisdiction. The dismissal was unanimous, final and on the merits of the appeal; the chamber found the first instance court’s view that the commercial court is competent to be correct.

🔐 The balance that could not be withdrawn and the request for further ID

According to the text of the decision, the claimant had completed the identity verification steps required when opening an account on the defendant platform, and for a long time bought, sold and withdrew crypto assets. In the claimant’s account, the platform later asked for the identity verification to be renewed. This included private information such as the value of the properties registered in the claimant’s name, the serial and sequence number of the old-style identity card, the mother’s and father’s names, the place of birth, and images of the front and back of the identity card. Without these details the verification was not completed, and crypto assets could neither be withdrawn nor sold.

The claimant argued that there was no obligation to submit documents requested without any explanation, and that asset information was not needed to process a withdrawal. The claimant sent notices through two separate notaries asking for the assets in the account to be transferred to the claimant’s own wallets, the account to be closed and the personal data to be destroyed. The claimant also states that e-mail requests went unanswered, and filed a complaint with the Karşıyaka Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office.

Finally, the claimant started enforcement proceedings without a court judgment against the platform for TL 272,893.01 before the Istanbul 28th Enforcement Office (file 2025/381). The defendant objected, the proceedings were suspended, and an objection annulment action based on Article 67 of the Enforcement and Bankruptcy Law was filed.

🛡️ The platform’s five objections

The defendant platform argued that the dispute did not arise from a debt, but from the user’s failure to meet the user’s own obligations. The objections that stand out in its response and appeal petitions are these:

🏛️ The decision of the Karşıyaka Commercial Court of First Instance

In its decision of 14.07.2025, Docket No. (E.) 2025/309, Decision No. (K.) 2025/493, the Karşıyaka Commercial Court of First Instance dealt with the objections one by one:

Although the defendant was successful on territorial jurisdiction, it still appealed the decision on subject-matter jurisdiction and the procedural requirement. In the defendant’s view, the first instance court should have declined jurisdiction; and even if not, the case should have been dismissed on procedural grounds because the mandatory mediation for commercial cases had not been completed.

⚖️ The reasoning of the regional court of appeal

The chamber recalled that, under Article 355 of the Code of Civil Procedure (HMK), the review is limited to the grounds in the appeal petition and to public policy. It then placed two groups of statutes side by side.

On one side is Consumer Protection Law No. 6502. Article 3 defines a consumer as a person acting for purposes that are not commercial or professional; Article 49 lists financial services as “all kinds of banking services, credit, insurance, private pension, investment and payment-related services”; Article 73 gives consumer courts jurisdiction over cases arising from consumer transactions; and Article 83 states that the existence of rules in other laws does not prevent a transaction from being treated as a consumer transaction.

On the other side are the Turkish Commercial Code and the Capital Markets Law. Article 4, paragraph 1, sub-paragraph (f) of the TTK treats disputes arising from matters provided for in the rules on banks, other credit institutions, financial institutions and lending as commercial cases, whether or not the parties are merchants. In the sub-paragraphs added to Article 3 of Capital Markets Law No. 6362 by Law No. 7518, a crypto asset is defined as “an intangible asset that can be created and stored electronically using distributed ledger technology or a similar technology, distributed over digital networks, and able to represent value or rights”, and a platform as an institution where crypto asset trading, initial sale or distribution, settlement, transfer and the custody these require are carried out.

On this basis the chamber reached the following conclusion: crypto assets were brought under legal regulation as financial investment instruments by being included in the Capital Markets Law through Law No. 7518, published in the Official Gazette of 02.07.2024; therefore the commercial court of first instance is competent to hear this absolute commercial case. The defendant’s appeal grounds on jurisdiction were not found well founded, and the appeal was rejected on the merits under Article 353/1-b-1 of the HMK.

One detail of the ruling matters: the chamber held that, “given the nature of the decision, there is no room at this stage to examine the other appeal grounds relating to the merits”. Issues such as arbitration, the mediation requirement and the KYC defence have therefore not been resolved on the merits by this decision; the case will be heard before the commercial court of first instance in Istanbul, which was held to be competent. The decision was given as final under Article 362/1-a of the HMK.

🧭 Different views in Ankara and İzmir

The importance of the decision becomes clearer when it is read together with the result reached by another regional court of appeal in a similar dispute. The 21st Civil Chamber of the Ankara Regional Court of Appeal, in an objection annulment action brought by a platform against its user, accepted that the user was a consumer and the transaction a consumer transaction, and held the consumer court to be competent. That decision is discussed in the article on jurisdiction in a crypto exchange caseTR.

The difference between the two decisions lies in their starting points:

1. The Ankara decision relied on the definitions of consumer and consumer transaction in Law No. 6502.
2. The İzmir decision emphasised that, after Law No. 7518, crypto assets and platforms are defined in the Capital Markets Law, and reached the result of an absolute commercial case under Article 4/1-f of the TTK; the decision also set out the provisions of Law No. 6502, but the outcome was built in the direction of a commercial case.
3. In the Ankara case the claimant was the platform, while in the İzmir case the claimant is the user; however, the reasoning of the İzmir decision rests not on the position of the parties but on the legislation on which the dispute is based.

These differing assessments by regional courts of appeal show that the question of jurisdiction in disputes between a crypto platform and its user has not yet settled into an established line. Because the İzmir decision was given as final, there will be no Court of Cassation review through this case; how the difference is resolved will depend on the approach taken in cases where the appeal route remains open.

📌 The limits of the decision

The decision does not discuss whether restricting the user’s access to the balance on KYC grounds is lawful. The platform’s defence based on MASAK obligations and the user’s objections concerning the protection of personal data were not examined at this stage because they relate to the merits. In the same way, the first instance court’s finding that the agreement contains no arbitration clause was not made the subject of the appeal review.

What the decision directly establishes is this: in the view of the 17th Civil Chamber of the İzmir Regional Court of Appeal, after Law No. 7518 entered into force, a claim dispute involving a crypto asset platform is an absolute commercial case under Article 4/1-f of the TTK and is heard before the commercial court of first instance. Other decisions on the platform–user relationship are available in the Precedent DecisionsTR archive.

❓ Common questions

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