Crypto Regulations in Poland
The crypto-services market in Poland does not have comprehensive regulation. Generally, cryptocurrency is not a part of the financial market within the meaning of Polish law, so basically it is not subject to specific, financial supervision.
Source: Dudkowiak
Cryptocurrency regulation is advancing in the EU which Poland is part of. Therefore, in addition to the Polish law, it’s imperative to monitor the quickly evolving European legal framework that’s being constructed to regulate cryptocurrency businesses operating in or from the EU. For instance, the European Commission is currently working on new KYC requirements for crypto businesses which will restrict virtual currency businesses from transacting with unhosted wallets without verifying their owners’ identities beforehand. The Commission has proposed removing the current threshold of 1,000 EUR which means in the near future all crypto transfers will be subject to KYC procedures.
Source: Rue
With the growing popularity of virtual currencies, the physical signs of which are Bitcoin ATMs, Poland has become a jurisdiction where cryptocurrency businesses – mining, sales, and purchase of crypto assets – are regulated and supervised by the national authorities.
Source: Rue
The Polish government does not consider crypto to be a “currency unit, a payment instrument, or electronic money.” Polish residents must provide financial statements from the crypto exchange they used to purchase and sell the digital coins to correctly report their profits from crypto trading. Polish residents can deduct investment costs from consecutive years. However, Polish residents may not deduct other sources of income, like the sale of shares.
Source: Freeman Law
Unfortunately, there is no specific legislation governing virtual currencies in Poland. Virtual currencies were first mentioned in Polish law in the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act of 1 March 2018 (Journal of Laws of 2020, Item 971 as amended) (‘AML Act’), which set out the first legal definition of this term and recognized cryptocurrency exchanges as obliged entities under the anti-money laundering (AML) and counter-terrorism financing (CTF) rules, subject to several obligations in this field.
Source: Mondaq
The Polish crypto tax regime concerns personal and corporate income taxes. It does not concern crypto exchange providers. For personal income taxes, profits from crypto transactions are taxed as income from cash capital. For private transactions, the revenue is regulated as income from property rights, and the gain is taxed progressively at rates between 18% and 32%. Profits from business activities are taxed at a flat rate of 19%. Crypto revenues of corporate entities are classified as capital gains. For larger companies, the tax rate is a flat 19%. Smaller companies are provided with a preferential flat rate of 15%. Entities reporting revenues under €2 million Polish złoties (or about $320,200 US dollars) are taxed at a 9% tax rate if they meet certain conditions.
Source: Freeman Law
The practice to date shows that most cryptocurrency exchanges in Poland – as long as their registered offices are located in the country – operate in the form of limited liability companies or joint stock companies. It is difficult to point to a uniform model of financing or obtaining operational funds by similar entities that is considered the standard on the market.
Source: Mondaq
The most recent development regarding the government’s attitude towards Bitcoin came in early 2018 when the Polish Finance Ministry announced that it was working on a set of regulations for cryptocurrency trading. These regulations are still being finalized, but they are expected to be introduced sometime in 2018. Until then, though, there is no telling what restrictions or rules the government might impose on Bitcoin trading.
Source: Business Cloud
The Polish authorities are announcing the arrest of 4 suspected hackers as part of a coordinated strike against cybercrime. Those arrested are believed to be among the most active cybercriminals in the country. This operation was carried out by the Polish Police Centre Bureau of Investigation (Centralne Biuro Śledecze Policji) under the supervision of the Regional Prosecutor’s Office in Warsaw (Prokuratura Regionalna w Warszawie), together with the cybercrime departments of provincial police headquarters and Europol. These 4 suspects are believed to be involved in a wide variety of cybercrimes.
Source: Europol
This time around, the fraud appears to have occurred through a Polish cryptocurrency exchange, which has seemingly shut down overnight and taken all its users’ funds with it. The exchange owners are also inaccessible and appear to have vanished into thin air. One user reports the president of the company ultimately opened a business in the neighboring region of Estonia within 24 hours after the closure.
Source: Live Bitcoin News
Polish police have arrested Ivan Manuel Molina Lee, president of Crypto Capital, on accusations of money laundering. According to reports in Polish newspaper W Polityce and news portal RMF24, the crypto entrepreneur was extradited to Warsaw, Poland under police escort. Polish authorities claim that Molina Lee is wanted in Poland for laundering up to 1.5 billion zloty or about $390 million “from illegal sources,” according to the Polish report.
Source: Coin Desk
Dmitry Vasiliev, who once managed the largest Russian crypto exchange, was apprehended at the Warsaw airport in early August but the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza broke the news last week, quoting undisclosed sources. A representative of the regional Prosecutor’s Office in the capital city has now confirmed the arrest to Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency.
Source: News Bitcoin
Poland is getting a fintech regulatory sandbox overseen by the country’s financial supervision authority but run by a group of industry players under a decentralised model. PKO Bank Polski, Huge Thing, Alior Bank, BusinessCaddy, Pekao, The HEart, Citi Handlowy Bank and BGŻ BNP Paribas Bank are all acting as sandbox operators, providing IT test environments for startups.
Source: FinExtra
