New Delhi: The Finance Ministry has brought transactions involving exchange, transfer and safekeeping of crypto assets under the purview of Prevention of Money-laundering Act.
As the PMLA coverage includes exchange between virtual digital assets and fiat currencies, it will widen taxation and regulatory net over crypto currency, as per a report by The Indian Express.
The new measures will help investigative agencies monitor crypto companies even as the Enforcement Directorate and Income Tax Department are probing several cases against crypto companies running cryptocurrency exchanges and transactions.
In the Union Budget last year, the government brought in a 30 per cent income tax on gains made from cryptocurrencies.
Back then, the government did not introduce any regulations on it, despite the Reserve Bank of India earlier proposed a ban on it which a court later set aside.
Further tightening its grip on crypto currency, ED had frozen bank balances of Rs 64.67 crore of company that ran cryptocurrency exchange, WazirX August last year.
Alongside, ED searched premises of a director of the company Zanmai Labs after it made agreements with Crowdfire Inc. USA, Binance (Cayman Islands) and Zettai Pte Ltd, Singapore, to ‘obscure the ownership of the crypto exchange’, according to The Indian Express.
Other companies that ED probed in similar cases last year included CoinSwitch and E-Nuggets.