Foreign Cryptocurrency Exchanges Could Face 18% Tax in India: Report

While India’s central bank maintains a hostile stance against local digital asset exchanges, it seems the country will look to implement a new tax for foreign trading venues, which have taken a sizeable share of the market lately.

• The world’s second-most populated nation continues to dabble with cryptocurrency regulations and legislations.
• The latest report on the matter claims that foreign digital asset exchanges may become subject to new taxation.
• More precisely, they could be required to pay GST if it’s established that they have customers operating from India.
• According to the coverage, almost all such trading platforms do not pay taxes now. However, should the new proposition come into effect, they will be taxed 18%.
• Businesses providing Online Information Database Access and Retrieval (OIDAR) services will be able to appoint a designated team responsible for paying taxes.
• At the same time, a Reuters report indicated that local exchanges still struggle with finding banking organizations willing to work with them.
• This is because the Reserve Bank of India continues with its adverse policy against the industry, despite the removal of the previously instituted ban.
• While the government contemplates how it should treat cryptocurrency assets, the RBI maintains that they are too speculative and dangerous. Most recently, the bank’s governor said the bank had conveyed its concerns to those in power.