Coinbase enters Indian market

The American cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase opened access to its services for users in India.

Chalo shuru karein!

That’s how you say “Come, let’s get started!” in Hindi and that’s our guiding light as we work to serve and grow the crypto and web3 community in India.

Learn more 👇https://t.co/d0McVp5AAy

— Coinbase (@coinbase) April 7, 2022

The company announced this at its own event in Bengaluru, as previously announced in a blog post by Coinbase co-founder and CEO Brian Armstrong.

He reminded that the exchange’s venture arm had already invested $150 million in local startups in the cryptocurrency and Web 3.0 space.

In 2021, Coinbase opened a technology centre in India, which now counts more than 300 employees. The company planned to increase its headcount to 1,000 by the end of 2022.

The exchange’s announcement came days after the country introduced a 30% tax on profits from cryptocurrency transactions and a controversial 1% levy within TDS. Regarding the prospects for broad implementation of digital asset services under tight regulation, Armstrong заметил:

«We know this will not be a straight road to the adoption of the technology. It is not yet clear how development will unfold. But we are committed to working with banking partners, regulators, and most importantly, the people of India, as they have shown real interest in cryptocurrencies and a desire to access these services and products».

In January 2022, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for a unified approach to shaping the regulatory framework for the crypto industry. Within India itself, public signals from authorities over the past years have been contradictory: from a total ban on digital currencies, even with criminal liability, to possible regulation as assets.

The Finance Ministry noted that the introduction of taxation does not determine the legal status of cryptocurrencies — that remains the prerogative of the relevant legislation.

As reported in 2021, opportunities to operate in the country were studied by Kraken, Bitfinex and KuCoin.

The world’s largest platform by trading volume, Binance, entered the Indian market in 2019 through the acquisition of the local exchange WazirX.