Bitcoin Forum

What do you think about China’s new civil code protecting inherited cryptocurrency?

Some articles for those who are curious:

• https://cointelegraph.com/news/chinese-citizens-are-now-able-to-inherit-cryptocurrency
• https://fintechzoom.com/fintech-news-bitcoin-news/china-passes-law-protecting-cryptocurrency-inheritance/
• https://coingeek.com/chinas-new-law-allows-digital-currencies-inheritance/
• https://news.bitcoin.com/china-law-cryptocurrency-inheritance/

There isn't much information on how they're planning on making such thing work though. But by the sounds of it, probably not a good idea? As for the funds to be inherited someone else should have access to the keys. Well, unless the funds are in custody in the first place, which we know is not a good idea in most cases.

Yeah, pass them bitcoins to the second, third, fourth, or even tenth generations until they can be allowed to spend it on something.

Yup. If a Chinese citizens accidentally dies without telling any of his family about the private keys/seed phrase to non-custodial wallets, then nobody can inherit it. If it's stored on a custodial service, then maybe it's possible to track and retrieve them.

Thanks for the links @mk4.
Seems like the OP forgot to input those for reference.
It's not that big news and that is why not many of us received it. Next time please do share the links.

Credits: Cointelegraph

So this means KYC to identify/prove if you are the true heir of the said cryptocurrency?
Takes out the privacy thing.
I'd rather let them inherit a piece of paper with all the details rather than giving out all my information.

The problem with China is that it can change the law whenever the CPC thinks it will afect it's existence. Therefore stop believing in China as it has never been transparent with its policy and there is always a hidden agenda behind whatever it does.

Not only in.China but in every country laws can be changed whenever political majority wishes to do so, every political party that has a needed majority in parlament can do that.
Anyway, I don't think there is anything special in this law, it tries to regulate inheritance of cryptocurrencies although I can't see the big importance of it. Nevertheless, China is probably only country that has such law specific for cryptocurrencies.

Heirs have to be verified whether the property to be inherited is a house or a land. It shouldn't be different if the inheritance are cryptocurrencies. We're also  talking about China here. A country where privacy is not that important.

I need a good example for how China's law could actually protect someone's CryptoCurrency inheritance or what not. Just including it in the law doesn't necessarily make it a good decision or anything, especially if there are possible loops that could actually be taken advantage of.


Absolutely no need for the law if it's just simple as this. Citizens just need to pass on their passwords, keys, secret codes, etc., to their heirs. If China actually held control over the internet, then this rule may be effective since in essence, they can pretty much control all accounts of transactions such that nothing illegal would pass their eyes, but they aren't.

I doubt it's just a matter of verification. It's kind of like you're leaving China with every possible secret code,passwords, keys, secret phrases, and the like, which is not just simple privacy. In essence, the real world and the virtual world (internet) is quite different from each other leaving such comparisons unsuitable imo.

Or what about copying/printing your private keys in a USB drive/a piece of paper, keep it in a sealed envelope, store it on a safety deposit box/a vault, and leave a letter with the instructions to your family?

I believe Hal Finney did it that way.

OP, your government doesn't have to be included. Self-sovereignty.

This could be related to what they are about to launch, the Digital Yuan or the Chinese CBDC. That law means that every person that owns cryptocurrency is required to record somewhere his private keys. Where's the place?

We don't know, we have no idea what's the complete law under that civil code. But as long it's not the government and each owner should just keep it individually, I guess there's no problem if it is like that.

Exactly always hidden, not transparent. I remember in 2017 too about the banning of ICO , thinking they won't have anything to do with it but they are coming up with different interest. These could be strategy of more acquisition.

This. I'd never trust it to any government, especially Chinese one. There's no way they're not gonna utilize this in some way or another

And we thought we can finally rest to think China doesn't ban BTC but they do what they wanna do.

One wouldn't have to share his private key when still alive that is because you can't trust anyone. Not even your son that will just abandon you whenever they got the private key and leave you with nothing. I have seen this situation with one family I've known.

If people are curious about inheritance, China is a communist nation where the people don't necessarily own what they have or use.
Government in China, more specifically the CCP owns every land and buildings in China, agricultural lands are collectively owned.
There are many restrictions on what the people can inherit to their child, now cryptocurrencies has been added as inheritable asset.

Generally, the law is good to allow the next generations to inherit their family's crypto since it can also be considered as an asset. But one thing I'm curious is that, does the law really have to do something about inheriting crypto? They can just share their keys to their heirs. The difference in crypto with other assets or property, it does not have any papers or documents needed to say that that property is yours, so it's like the law isn't that much needed when it comes to inheriting crypto.

Maybe the purpose of this is for the Chinese government to earn tax. When you pass your asset to another person, there is an inheritance tax, and I think this is the reason why the Chinese government made something like this. Because in crypto, this is not actually necessary but what can you expect from the government, they want to earn on everything.

The articles related to the said law that has been passed does not have much information for us to rely into, maybe they included this to their ruling but I doubt they would do this. The implementation is quite questionable, what I think they will do is they will gather all your crypto keys including password, seed phrases, etc. which might be a contradicting stuff for cryptocurrencies since most of the people embraced the crypto because of the decentralization. I believe that they have studied this, a simple argument with " you can leave it just to your family before dying" will simply shuts out.

Of course he did, coz there no such rule as this, but I know Hal he's not going to have this on his own. Besides, he knows that he got living in a borrowed time so he did what he must have to do.

Again, this will only do for cases such as sudden death, so the family will take over his/her crypto belongings which I think is good to have. Let's see where this would go.

China protecting cryptocurrency? It does not sound right to me when a government is offering to protect cryptocurrency. Cryptocurrency is a relief from the government's shackles in the first place.

I'd rather keep a hidden and locked safe inside the house complete with information and instruction rather then give access to the government. Whatever happens to me, my family will still soon find those safe.

To be honest, I don't think that any government should have anything to do with monitoring or controlling cryptos at least for now.
But of course, China is China and they will do what they want.

This is only applicable if you entrusted your bitcoin to a platform like a trading or investing platform that are legally compliance with the law of the government, however, this is not possible if you have a bitcoins in your wallet and you forget to transfer it before you die.

I think this is a good law, it recognizes how valuable bitcoin is and its potential in the future.
I thought China was anti crypto but then they are making this kind of regulation, I'm a bit confuse.

As bitcoin and cryptocurrencies gain more and more publicity, it's really to be expected that we're going to have tighter and tighter regulations and control in general. And what way to gain control than to probably convince other people to use centralized custody?

And it's not only going to be in China. It's most likely going to be the same with the US and with most governments.

I think for a country whose crypto policy wasn't always favorable, it's a nice step towards recognizing cryptocurrencies. I am curious about the details, though, because if it means Bitcoin's considered property and one has to pay heavy taxes to inherit BTC, then it's not such good news. Plus Botnake also pointed out it doesn't apply to individuals with Bitcoin wallets, and that doesn't sound good. In fact, this would push people not to hold their cryptos privately, so that in the event of their death one could inherit them. And the question of private keys is very relevant here.

China is indeed one step ahead of other countries. The rules for deciding cryptocurrency as a property that must be protected by law is a good decision.
Inheritance in the form of virtual assets or digital currency in the form of bitcoin will be fully protected by law in China. That way assets owned by people who have died can be inherited to the intended person so that assets will not be lost or just disappear.
This new civil law will be issued and enacted on January 1, 2021.

This could be beneficial for Cryptocurrency as we know it only has limited supply by this method those people who will inherit the Crypto's will have restrictions on spending because the family consider it as a legitimate asset to hold and will have second thoughts on burning it out on buying things or converting it to cash.

In my opinion the new law regarding inheritance related to cryptocurrency by China is actually very positive. But China makes it
the new law definitely aims to want income in the form of tax. So protecting cryptocurrency is actually used as an excuse to impose
taxes. And I'm sure other countries will follow in China's footsteps.