Deputy Prime Minister Le Minh Khai has tasked the Ministry of Finance of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam with spearheading a study for the implementation of a legal framework governing virtual assets like Bitcoin in the country.
The government department of the Southeast Asian nation will identify the specific legal documents requiring enactment or amendment for cryptocurrency management. We are glad about this report on Vietnam’s cryptocurrency industry, and we believe it will enlighten our readers.
We gathered that an official decision or policy in Vietnam regarding cryptocurrency regulation had not been reached yet. Nonetheless, we believe this latest development demonstrates the country’s eagerness to formalize or legalize virtual currencies’ presence.
Based on the report posted online by cryptocurrency-focused digital news outlet Blockworks, the Ministry of Finance of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam will conduct the research alongside the ministries of information and communications and justice and the Vietnamese central bank, the State Bank of Vietnam.
They will perform the research intended as a guide for the forthcoming policy on cryptocurrency as the country pivots toward a digital economy. Additionally, the study will assess virtual currencies’ effect on Vietnam’s changing economic landscape.
The researchers will evaluate the requirements needed to develop cryptocurrency legislation to control the risks involved but will not impact other sectors like the information and e-commerce industries.
Furthermore, Vietnam’s upcoming legal cryptocurrency framework for cryptocurrencies will include crypto-assets’ analysis, these virtual assets’ relationship with fiat money, and their utilization within and outside the country.
The study which will guide cryptocurrency policy formulation is another measure in Vietnam’s march to formally make cryptocurrencies legal. It comes after the nation’s central bank prohibited Bitcoin and other crypto-assets for use as a payment means back in 2017.
In August of that year, Vietnam’s then Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc issued Decision 1255, which sought the establishment of a legal framework to manage virtual assets.
The latest research extends upon that decree, further studying cryptocurrencies’ relationship with real financial assets and evaluating the timeframe needed for the legal framework’s implementation.
We think the Vietnamese Government’s latest initiative is a timely one. We believe it is high time that Vietnam legalizes cryptocurrencies.
After all, we gathered that cryptocurrency trading and holding as investment assets is still allowed in the Southeast Asian country, although using the crypto-assets as payment is prohibited.
Moreover, Vietnam’s adoption of digital assets by the total population is among the highest worldwide.
With these realities in the Southeast Asian nation, we think it is about time that a legal framework for trading, owning, and using cryptocurrencies as financial instruments be formulated and implemented there.
We believe this formal document will facilitate Vietnam’s proper transformation into a digital economy where digital money is legally recognized and honored in that society.
