Educational Byte: Banned, Partially Banned, or Legal—How Crypto Laws Differ Worldwide

In the early days of cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin was often viewed as an obscure coin designed for criminals. The darknet marketplace Silk Road brought it a lot of popularity, but also a lot of bad rep. Its decentralized nature (not issued or controlled by any government or company) was constantly misunderstood, but that wouldn’t last for much longer. Soon, other coins were created, more use cases came along, coin prices skyrocketed, millions of users joined —and regulators found themselves needing to include this asset in the laws of their countries, somehow.

That “somehow” isn’t always good. Sometimes, they create laws to ban or limit this type of money significantly. Many times, they make it legal, but what that means, in practice, varies from territory to territory. The Atlantic Council categorizes the legal status of crypto worldwide as this:

“legal (where all activities are permitted), partial ban (where one or more activity is not permitted), and general ban (where all activity is limited).”

The practical side of those concepts is more complicated, though.

Legal isn’t Chaos

They say that all activities with crypto are permitted in countries in which it’s legal, but stop there, because terms and conditions apply. Just because crypto is legal doesn’t mean people can use it as they like without any requirements. For example, Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) rules require related companies (like crypto exchanges) to verify identities and report suspicious transactions. This is to prevent illegal activities like money laundering or funding criminal organizations. So, while you can buy, sell, or trade crypto, you might need to provide personal information to comply with these laws.

Businesses dealing with crypto often face even more rules. They might need special licenses to operate legally. For instance, in the European Union, the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation sets strict guidelines for crypto companies, including how they should protect customer funds and report their activities. Stablecoins without proper reserves are banned, and issuers of new coins have some strict requirements to comply with.

Additionally, there’s another magical word: taxes. Depending on the country, crypto transactions are mostly subject to taxes, just like any other financial activity. This means users need to keep records and report their earnings to tax authorities, depending on certain established limits.

Even in countries where crypto is partially banned, taxes could apply to individual users. The “partially banned” bit often refers to how financial companies are banned from handling these assets in that region. While individual users are free to transact with crypto, licenses aren’t granted for crypto companies there, and banks can’t provide services to crypto exchanges, for example. In this case, consumer protection and AML rules for crypto are usually nonexistent.

Banned is Chaos

In countries where crypto is “fully banned”, most activities with it are forbidden. Its mere use can be punished by law, although possession alone is often not illegal. People have been arrested for crypto-related activities in places like Bangladesh, China, Tunisia, Egypt, and Morocco, where they have “full bans” on cryptocurrencies. Now, does that fully stop people from owning, trading, mining, or doing whatever with cryptos, even if they live there? Not really.

We just need to check the Crypto Adoption Index by Chainalysis to notice an interesting fact: exactly 50% of the countries in the top ten by global crypto adoption have partial or full bans on cryptocurrency. China, famous for its wide ban on crypto, is in the top 20 by adoption. Despite laws and warnings, people are still using cryptocurrency in these places. Just without all regulations designed to make this space safer, so banning crypto instead of legalizing it seems counterproductive.

Decentralized cryptocurrencies were built to be censorship-resistant, and, as we’ve mentioned above, they’re not issued or controlled by a central entity. That’s why they can’t get effectively banned by anyone. There’s no company to blame or expel, but a wide network of nodes worldwide that authorities just can’t shut down all at the same time. However, while the governments are unable to shut down cryptocurrency networks,they can still target individual users, if the network is blockchain-based.

Decentralization is Freedom

Decentralization is a very positive feature, because, even in countries where crypto is banned, people might still use it for any reason –legitimate, but also illegitimate. Of course, the country might consider it illegitimate according to its own laws, but its government’s credibility and moral factors are different things. Some people rely on these assets to protect their savings from high inflation or unstable local currencies. Others use it to send money to family abroad or to protect from financial censorship by oppressive governments. In places with strict financial controls, crypto can also offer financial freedom and access to global markets.

If you want to do any of those things and many more, the Obyte ecosystem could be for you. This is a fully decentralized and censorship-resistant crypto network, available for anyone, in any part of the world. It uses a Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) structure, and transactions are confirmed without middlemen like miners or “validators”. This high level of decentralization makes Obyte more resilient to censorship and restrictions. Plus, it’s fully legal in most countries, offering a secure and accessible way to use crypto.