News
Think You Own Your Crypto? New UK Law Would Ensure It – DL News
- The UK Law Commission has developed a bill that will address a situation of legal uncertainty.
- The commission’s goal is to ensure that cryptocurrencies are legally treated as personal property.
UK law is not entirely clear whether cryptocurrencies can be considered personal property.
This is according to the UK Law Commission, which argues that while most investors assume that when they buy cryptocurrencies, they are “acquiring property rights in the same way as buying, say, a watch or a laptop.”
“As the law currently stands, this is not necessarily the case,” the respected legal body said in a new report on Tuesday.
The report was accompanied by a solution: a new bill to consolidate the legal status of digital assets as personal property.
This could be huge for the estimated 4.7 million Britons valued hold cryptocurrencies.
“This will allow the courts to determine a range of issues,” the report says.
If passed, the law would help clarify how cryptocurrencies are treated in cases of bankruptcy, estate planning or theft.
Flexible law
The commission is an independent body responsible for reviewing UK law. It began investigating whether English and Welsh property laws apply to digital assets in 2020.
Join the community to receive our latest stories and updates
At the time, then-Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak expressed ambitions to transform the UK into a cryptocurrency hub as Britons invested more.
In 2023, the commission decided that, in most cases, the legislation of England and Wales is sufficiently flexible to regulate cryptocurrencies.
This means that any asset, from Bitcoin to non-fungible tokens and some types of digital contracts, can be considered personal property, without Parliament having to write extensive new laws.
There was one small area of uncertainty, however: it was unclear whether cryptocurrencies fell within the two categories of personal property recognised under UK law.
These two categories are made up of tangible assets (cars, laptops, bags) and intangible assets (contracts, stocks, and debt).
The bill that will now go to Parliament to be converted into law aims to remedy this situation.
Without that clarification, courts may try to lump cryptocurrencies together with intangible assets, said Adam Sanitt, head of litigation, knowledge, innovation and corporate support EMEA at law firm Norton Rose Fulbright. DL News in March.
This is problematic because intangible assets are creations of the legal system, while cryptocurrencies are not.
“How the law treats digital assets, what rights you have over them, how you own them, how you transfer them to other people—that treatment is different, because digital assets don’t exist by virtue of the legal system, but independently of it,” Sanitt said.
The money in your bank account, for example, is a legal creation. The government could pass a law to cancel it.
However, if the UK passed a law banning Bitcoin, Bitcoin would not cease to exist.
Sanitt said: “That’s why digital assets are so important: neither the government nor the legal system can take them away from you.”
Contact the author at joanna@dlnews.com.