Cambodia

Cambodia supervises securities and derivatives through the Securities and Exchange Regulator of Cambodia, which licenses derivatives brokers — a domestic regime that several neighbours lack. The National Bank of Cambodia oversees banking and the currency.

De facto dollarisation

Cambodia is one of the most dollarised economies in the world without having formally adopted the dollar. The overwhelming majority of bank deposits are in dollars, prices are quoted in dollars, and the riel functions largely as small change for amounts below a dollar.

This arose from the 1990s, when confidence in domestic institutions was low and dollars arrived with international operations. It delivered stability and it has proved very hard to reverse: the central bank has promoted riel use for years, including through the Bakong digital payment system, with limited effect. Dollarisation is easy to enter and extremely difficult to exit, because it reflects a choice by millions of people about what they trust.

For a trader the practical consequence is convenient — funding a dollar-denominated account involves no conversion — and the analytical one is that Cambodia has little independent monetary policy.

The licensing regime

SERC licenses derivatives brokers under a domestic framework with capital and conduct requirements, and publishes the list. It also publishes warnings about unlicensed operators, of which there are many: Cambodia has become a base for large-scale investment fraud operations targeting victims worldwide, including compounds where trafficked workers are forced to run them. These have been extensively documented and are the subject of international law enforcement attention.

What that means

A platform contacting you from this region, however professional, warrants extreme scepticism. The pattern is consistent: a relationship built over weeks through messaging apps, a platform showing gains, pressure to deposit more, obstruction at withdrawal, then a fee demanded to release funds. A screen balance is a web page.

Checks

Use SERC's licensed list and its warnings; verify foreign brokers on their own regulators' registers.