India doesn’t intend to regulate crypto sales and purchases

Pankaj Chaudhary, the Minister of State in the Finance Ministry of India, has shared that the country has no plans to regulate the sales and purchase of cryptocurrency in the country.

Pankaj disclosed the details during a parliamentary meeting that was held on August 5. During the meeting, Pankaj addressed several questions regarding the country’s stance on crypto.

“Currently, there is no proposal to bring legislation for regulating the sales and purchase of virtual digital assets in the country,” Pankaj said.

Adding to his statement, he also made it clear that for specific oversight needs, Anti Money Laundering (AML) and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) laws are set in place. This is evident from the country’s actions against exchanges like Binance, KuCoin, Bitget, etc.

Crypto assets are unregulated in India

Pankaj also made it clear that crypto assets are unregulated in India, and the government doesn’t collect data on these assets. Interestingly, he also addressed that in India, instead of the term ‘crypto,’ the asset class is referred to as “virtual digital asset.”

Even though Pankaj mentioned that crypto is unregulated in the country, India still has a stringent tax measure on the asset class. According to the Finance Act 2022, a 30% tax is imposed on the transfer of cryptocurrencies.

Pankaj also added that losses from the transfer of crypto can’t be set off against any other income. Additionally, there is a 1% TDS on every crypto transaction.

Binance’s tussle with India

India has demanded almost $86 million from Binance in unpaid taxes. Sources revealed that the notice was sent to the exchange for collecting fees from the Indian users.

“Binance reportedly earned at least Rs 4,000 crore from transaction fees charged to Indian customers. The company has a user base of 90 million users globally, including a substantial number of customers from India too,” said a top source privy to The Times of India.

However, the exchange has challenged the tax showcause notice according to the details shared with CoinDesk. The exchange was also hit with a $2.2 million fine in June for violating the country’s anti money laundering rules.