Bitcoin Forum

Thailand's move to exempt crypto transfers through government-approved exchanges is pretty interesting.

The government's goal is to promote cryptocurrency trade on authorized exchanges (approved and regulated by SEC).

However, this is just temporary. The tax exemption will eventually stop on Dec. 31, 2023.

I see what's happening here...

They fail to encourage traders to prefer authorized exchanges since there are cheaper alternatives. The problem is digital asset operators see this as an opportunity to provide services outside the government's surveillance and control.

It's a good thing because:

1. Government already fully acknowledges crypto trading. No more resistance.
2. They want to create a more secure environment for crypto investors. Better security = Higher confidence = More investors.
3. They don't want to control the blockchain--they can't. They only want to regulate transactions to protect investors from losing money. Of course, they want the government to make a little bit of profit, too. (As long as that profit--tax--benefits the people, that's fine)

Overall, this is good for the crypto space.

I'm afraid this is coming from a limited viewpoint.

What's happening in Thailand is probably more bad than good. But not the worst, of course. I hope I'm not really updated with the current status of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency there, but it seems the ban on the use of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as payment had just taken effect in April. That's just last month.

This is untimely. This happened just as Bitcoin and crypto have already developed a good relationship with businesses, just as Bitcoin started to fulfill its role as a currency. Now, it is relegated to just being an asset, an investment opportunity, where people can trade but not spend. So this must be a step backward rather than forward. 

Have traded personally several times in Thailand on P2P exchanges like LocalBitcoins where the volume is pretty high and never faced any issues despite the ban that you mentioned though I can understand why it's a step backward.

Their government banning crypto only for payments didn't really affect the market much overall, but it was still a bad decision in my opinion. It's a good thing that they didn't try to ban them completely though.

Treating cryptocurrencies as just assets(Not payment methods) won't help improve adoption in the long-term.

I had to look up the news because I didn't know what you were talking about. I found this, for example:

https://news.bitcoin.com/thailand-exempts-crypto-transfers-from-vat-until-end-of-2023/

What I don't understand is, in Thailand is VAT applied to transfers? There is nothing added there. VAT is supposed to be a tax that is levied when there is value added, and I am not aware of such a tax being applied elsewhere, as capital gains tax is usually applied if you earn money, but VAT as if when you buy a loaf of bread?

Well, each country may have its own rules. The doubt I have now is that I guess they apply VAT but not capital gains, no? Or do they apply both. Let's see if someone who lives in Thailand clarifies.

No, the government can't protect the investors from losing money via crypto trading. The government wants to protect the investors from being scammed. Losing money is part of crypto trading. Nobody can make profits without someone else losing money, it's a zero sum game.
Anyway, I'm skeptical about the current crypto regulation in Thailand. This crypto regulation seems to be what they call "too little, too late".
Nobody could keep the investors from staying in Thailand. They could move their money at a country, where there are better crypto regulations and the crypto exchanges are offering better services.
I'm not a fan of centralized crypto exchanges and I think that the crypto world has moved into the wrong direction. We need to go back to the basics- hardware wallets an decentralized exchanges.

Op is talking about the tax exemption. Is it a VAT exemption for crypto exchanges? Or is it that crypto businesses are currently exempt from any taxes in Thailand? If the exemption is lifted, will the taxation affect individual traders, crypto exchange companies or both?
I think it's reasonable when governments try to regulate the crypto industry, as long as the intent is to encourage the industry to come out of the shadows and flourish, not to kill it. I hope Thailand is trying the favorable approach, but banning crypto as payment is not a nice move.

It's good for the crypto space there in Thailand.

They're encouraging people to trade to government registered exchanges so that they'll also have the security that everyone is on the right track of using a legal exchange.

Other than that, it has to stop and then the taxes will come. Well, not that new and basically it's going to cover everything there through this introduction as it sets and prepares everyone in accepting the crypto taxes after.

This is mainly true, you shouldn't lose money and government should be there to protect you from scammers, not from dropping prices. If you are sending your money to someone you do not know in crypto, then consider that as a gone money and not the reality.

We need to really make sure that we shouldn't really do something that would be beneficial for it. All in all I need to make sure that things are looking great and it is not a big problem for us by keeping it hidden and not tell anyone that you have coins, even if you are rich, just make sure that nobody could ask you any money or suggest you investments because you should tell them you have none.

This is very good. I think this is about providing security to the people and not to stop them. The youth will have more benefit in this because they have more years to stay around and can invest to hodl more cryptocurrency investment. They scare of scam exchanges will be reduced because the government making sure to secure exchanges in their country.

Governments do not make sure to secure exchanges, they give you the impression that you are secured by setting bogus regulations and entry barriers to certain industries. The objective of Bitcoin is to give users financial Independence rather than depending on third parties, using centralized exchanges means you are submitting your assets and personal details to a central server, from where it can be stolen or sold.

I offer a more optimistic view.

Gold could be used as a currency the same way it's used as an asset. There used to be a system of currency backed by gold which acted in place of lugging around pieces of metal to trade with. Bitcoin's convenience bifurcates the utility as a currency and an asset. Whether people store their coins for long term appreciation or whether they use it as a currency, there are still funds allocated to crypto that would have otherwise been utilized for other assets or currencies. A win for crypto either way.

But to gain the confidence of other users, we need the existence of these centralized exchanges, which are under the government regulations. We know that bitcoin should not be in any way tied to a centralized organization but we are already in the stage of massive adoption. And to welcome this adoption, government intervention is inevitable. This I believe, we can't escape from. We don't know where will our details will end up with but this is the stage where we need to accept that centralized platforms are already here to support adoption.

Governments allowing specific exchanges to perform the trading of cryptocurrencies limit the usage. The reason for which the government have taken the decision is really appreciable and a forward thinking compared to the countries that make a direct ban of cryptocurrencies. Slowly the country needs to provide way to spending, through which the real usage of crypto can be understood. What Thailand government have done, given the access similar to digital gold.

Anyone who needs a decentralized currency to be used on a centralized platform inorder to gain "confidence" could as well keep on using fiat.
Bitcoin is not running a marketing campaign, if you read about it and understand the concept and it interests you, then by all means buy some, of you're not as interested,  do not.

Governments can do what they want. Individual users can choose to use Bitcoin as they wish. There are a many channels through which one can maintain pseudo anonymity.

i would have appreciate this if the link to read further on this is attached for clearer understanding because the last time i red about  Thailand on cryptocurrency use for payment  (https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/03/23/thailand-bans-crypto-as-means-of-payment/%3foutputType=amp) wasn't on a good side to favour crypto, even though the country is not against cryptocurrency in it entirety but places ban against the financial institutions to use such for payment, meaning individuals can still maintain their independent use of cryptocurrency as an asset or for trading.

i understand to an extent all that is in OP discussion about Thailand government and the digital asset providers otherwise called exchanges, but your point could have been more understandable if the link to portray this is included as you know how the community here really have interest on a reference link.

The government  has different ways of treating bitcoins ..mostly it is in favour of them.
The info in op seems like coming from limited resources. The bitcoin condition is not very good in Thailand.

The efforts made by Thailand are a form of their government's awareness of this cryptocurrency. Because in truth, even if they strictly prohibited cryptocurrencies, this would not go so well. So they take this step for their survival too, in the sense that after this which path they will take, including taking cryptocurrency taxes after that.

If Bitcoin is basically a currency, and someone says you can't use it that way, then it's actually attacking the very essence of what Bitcoin represents. This, of course, does not prevent individual transactions, but it undoubtedly sends a clear message that this is something that is forbidden in public business. If we remember that Turkey did the same thing more than a year ago, then it is very possible that some other countries will do the same in the future.

Bitcoin is obviously a problem from the perspective of most world governments only if viewed from a currency perspective, because the centralization of the monetary system is one of the cornerstones of human society’s control. So I think this is a change in tactics that once went in the direction that Bitcoin is something used by criminals to the point that mining it is a big environmental problem - and if you can't convince someone that something is bad, you simply disable it legally.

If we add to that a profit tax of say 30% as is the case in India, then we will throw a lot of small players out of the game.

Very small market for the crypto in Thailand. The problem is, they have tourist based income so its underestimated for the use of crypto currencies. How many tourists would go there and spend their crypto's? I mean look at it from the point of view of tourist who is there to chill out and relax with massage centres. Will he be waiting in the queue to open up wallet and spend bitcoins until it gets confirmed on the network? We have already seen waiting drawback in Starbucks stores (near me) and based on that in the bigger market things could be little messy.

It would be far easier for tourist to exchange the currencies locally and pay in hand cash quickly to avail the services in there. For local use case I am not sure if there is any stronger opinion.

maybe it means that bitcoin runs smoothly in thailand only as an asset not a payment system with bitcoin. so everywhere now many people adopt bitcoin only for investment and not for legal tender. I think there are not so many tourists who enter Thailand, so they are forced to pay with crypto except before providing the service, they first provide an online order wallet and don't have to wait too long.

Hmm, it looks like a kind of amnesty rather than anything else and drawing business through government controlled exchanges is a nice perk to help them get established with the local audience. They could offer all sorts of favorable perks later on if they are able to grow their customer base wide enough. However the real impetus is drawing in funds held by the citizens of Thailand without charging them the heavier taxes that might be liable through third party exchanges. Those third party exchanges are clearly not sharing information with the government and this enables the government to source some information on people who are using cryptocurrency to better monitor them in future, so beware any longer term issues if you are based in Thailand and earning from elsewhere.

1. Resistance is futile because getting rid completely is impossible yet people could make out transactions without the government able to know.
2. Minding about citizens safety in terms of any investment is a good initiative or a must thing for government to do so.
3. Stopping is useless but of course they would only able to touch centralized platforms if they do really think off about revenue.

Good to see that recognition is getting more wider and better but of course dont expect that each country would do the same.

I think that both are the same, and there's no changes have been made at all because sec are still related to government right? Reading the first line I feel positive because I thought their government is promoting decentralization. It's like an opposite to what El Salvador did where they introduced a centralized wallet despite making btc a legal tender.

You also talk about tax exemption there though I am not sure if it was a good thing or not because tax are also important for each countries or to the governments because it can help them with their plans and developments. It can be a good thing for those who don't want to pay a tax because they are too greedy or stingy. This was not permanent anyway, so I guess that's fine?

Now government have understood what they're missing out in regards to the collection of tax from crypto companies, yet they never have a full support for the activities of cryptocurrency to be running as expected but because of their own selfish interest in the collection of tax makes them to create some regulation to suit their own purpose, another reason is for them as well the (politicians) to be able to invest in cryptocurrency as they would individually love to secure their collective asset in crypto than in fiat banks just to maintain their privacy but they wouldn't want to give that same opportunity to the public, but i think we are moving fast in getting closer to global adoption as many countries now linient the run of cryptocurrency regulations unlike the ban place initially.

I live in Thailand, and in my opinion the government does not banned with cryptocurrencies, currently some top exchanges such as binance and huobi also expand by making Thai -language applications, even the 2 exchanges often advertise on local tv, which I feel is crypto experienced development positive in Thailand even though the state does not legalize.

Same here in the Philippines. They have already acknowledged that we can’t be protected from market volatility of crypto trading but rather protect us from getting scammed. Even with those projects that are prone to rug pull, the Securities and Exchange Commission in the Philippines and the Central Bank, they’re just only reminding the public to be careful and wary about the risks about joining these startup campaigns, IDOs, etc., since they can’t do anything about it.

This is something that my nations government is "trying" to do but not too hard, they just had some exchanges scam the customers so they had to put out warnings here and there but that's about it, and they told the exchanges to put a disclaimer saying that crypto is volatile and you could lose all of your money and you should be willing to take that risk when you are investing, that is the only thing and I believe that we shouldn't really think that is good enough, people are already aware of it.

The laws to catch and jail the scammers should be even bigger if we want to stop scammers, internationally come to an agreement over getting those people to nations they scam and jail them.

Same goes into the place on where i do live in on which its still in neutral phase which still cant be sure on what would be their taking towards crypto or bitcoin whether they would be accepting or legalizing it or
totally ban and that would be always a question but for now they are still in neutral phase on which they do still allow crypto transactions and other things related to it but of course there would be some
sort of limitations whenever big  amounts would be going inside with your bank accounts which would raises up some question but if the time comes that if its been regulated then
i dont see any problems in related to this.

About 3 months ago i was in thailand because the company was looking for suppliers of agricultural raw materials from thailand, and what i feel is that there are no banned from exchanges sites like what happened in my country, even when i was in a mall restaurant then i saw some people wearing logos cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, Doge, and NFT. after I tried to ask colleagues in Thailand that the Thai government still banned cryptocurrencies.

I would be interested to know how residents in thailand and asia feel about the SEC.

Do they have negative or positive views of foreign regulators like the SEC regulating their own markets. The international media has illustrated unflattering portrayals of americans for years. Does asia and europe now want that unflattering image of american regulation determining key aspects of their own native markets. Do they care about state sovereignty. Thailand being geographically close to china, wouldn't it make more sense for chinese, russian or EU regulators to announce proposals for the future direction of european and asian markets.

Its hard to gauge which direction the winds of public opinion are blowing as most normal people have no voice or representation in the media. Which makes it difficult to tell what the true state of crypto is in thailand atm.

Most countries will simply follow what other big countries are doing so until that the government doesn't want to lose the tax revenue from the crypto market sector so they regulate it and going to collect taxes that is the reality behind it. Anyway these are not going to save the traders or going to bring huge revenue as well so there should be more guidelines and regulations so people will report their taxes precisely.

Thailand has recently been in the spotlight from other countries / the world, after the policies carried out on crypto, these days it is viral with legal marijuana, I am sure that whatever policy the Thai government takes will have a good impact on the Thai people's economy in the future.

Point number one, if the government recognizes crypto in the trading and investment system, I think the positive impact will be better in the future, especially marijuana farmers in Thailand, they will easily buy/sell transactions with digital/crypto currencies, believe it or not crypto in Thailand will run even better and will boost Thailand's economy more advanced in the future.

It's a good thing that most countries in Asia are now accepting and developing cryptocurrency. Maybe because the effect on huge countries is visible despite the banning of other Asian countries. I hope they could completely legalize the adaption of cryptocurrency and see how it could affect their economy positively. The government will surely interfere but as long as they aren't banning main exchanges, the cryptocurrency will continuously grow and develop in a country.

Since I am also from Southeast Asia, I am quite happy to know crypto is developing quite well in Thailand. Although the Thai government does not
support crypto yet, at least the Thai government does not prohibit its citizens from using crypto. So Thai residents can make money from crypto,
meaning the economy in Thailand can improve, and as a result, the lives of the Thai people can be more prosperous. And I believe the Thai government
will eventually realize the importance of legalizing crypto. I am sure that in the next few years there will be more and more countries in the world that
will legalize crypto, because it is proven that crypto can have a positive impact. Even in a pandemic situation crypto has helped the economy of
many people, so the future of crypto is very bright.