World cryptocurrency laws still far from ideal

Alas, the strict policy towards digital currency market is still present in some parts of the world, no matter how cryptocurrency evangelists try to say the future is already here.

For example, the central bank of Vietnam has announced measures the likes of which even China have not implemented – since 1 January 2018, all cryptocurrency circulation will be prohibited. A fee equal to nine thousand U.S. dollars will be charged from violators. It would be relevant to remind that Vietnam is still a one-party state with many conservatives in power. They might even genuinely think Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme and they are doing a good service for the country by banning it.

Lebanon’s central bank has taken almost the same counter-coin measure on its soil. But it does not exclude issuing state-backed cryptocurrency. The latter statement matches the popular trend set by China, although we have yet to see the first state-backed altcoin – all governmental claims still remain claims.

UAE, while relatively rich, does not seem to embrace cryptocurrencies without any doubt: its central bank has recently warned against the use of coins as a medium of payment and officials still believe digital currencies are not backed by anything tangible.

Meanwhile in Russia, as our regular readers know, the high-level authorities have decided to take the regulative approach instead of forbidding everything, but some ministers are still very skeptical towards Bitcoin free circulation. However, the Russian business ombudsman offers to regulate Bitcoin exchange just like the dollar and euro, but he is also against uncontrolled payments of Bitcoin.

All this tells that cryptocurrency legislation evolution, while having some setbacks in the first world, has even more obstacles in the second and the third world countries. Generally, the governments fear that decentralized cryptocurrency would be powerful enough to compete with local fiat money, which is unacceptable for every central bank.