After hemming and hawing in its strange relationship with cryptocurrencies and the businesses they imply, the Philippine government decided to make room for a set aside economic zone. The scheme is offered in hopes of generating more tax income, employment for its people, and perhaps a dedicated crypto university.
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Philippines Allows Crypto Companies to Operate Economic Zone
Cagayan Economic Zone Authority (CEZA) spokesman Raul Lambinos told Reuters, “We are about to licence 10 platforms for cryptocurrency exchange. They are Japanese, Hong Kong, Malaysians, Koreans. They can go into cryptocurrency mining, initial coin offerings, or they can go into exchange.” Exchanges providing onramps to the nation’s fiat money, on the other hand, are encouraged to launch offshore to avoid running afoul of Philippine law.
Raul Lambino
Such zones offer advantageous tax regimes in the hope of creating more employment for Filipinos. Early this year, the country legalized such zones for crypto, which appears to be more welcoming to digital assets than other countries in the region.
Local authorities estimate over two years crypto companies will invest more than $1 million, with ten percent of that going toward building a tax base. Ambitious plans also include a possible blockchain-based financial technology university to help feed workers to surrounding businesses in the zone.
A Strange Relationship with Crypto
The government appears to be responding to popular sentiment regarding cryptocurrency, as it has not been very supportive of late: its Philippine National Police arrested bitcoiners, accusing them of running a Ponzi scheme, and the country’s Securities and Exchange Commission came down against cloud mining, asserting such contracts are too close to securities.
Senator Leila M. de Lima
