Vietnam’s Deputy Prime Minister Le Minh Khai has entrusted the nation’s Ministry of Finance to lead research for the implementation of a legal framework surrounding digital assets. According to a report by local news agency Vietnamnet, the ministry is tasked to identify specific legal documents requiring amendment or enactment for the management of the evolving asset class.
The research is being conducted in association with the Ministries of Justice, Information and Communications as well as the State Bank of Vietnam. A decision to study and guide policy discussion extends upon multiple research mandates that assess crypto’s impact on the country’s shifting digital economy.
It will also assess the requirements needed to develop legislation aimed at controlling risks but in a way that won’t affect other sectors including e-commerce and information technology, the report said.
Previously, in the Strategy for Development of E-Government towards Digital Government in the period of 2021 – 2025, with a vision to 2030, approved on June 15, 2021, the Prime Minister assigned the State Bank of Vietnam to lead the research and pilot use of virtual money based on blockchain technology in 2021 – 2023.
Vietnam’s flip-flops with crypto regulation
The nation’s crypto relationship has been marred with complications over the past few years. In 2014, the South East Asian nation first banned Bitcoin transactions but did a complete reversal in 2017 when the then PM Nguyen Xuan Phuc approved BTC as a form of payment. However, in 2018 BTC was banned for the second time.
Then in 2020, the then Vietnam’s government established a crypto research group, which was instructed to research various developments in the virtual asset market and recommend legal policy proposals.
Despite the absence of a legal framework for owning, trading, and using cryptocurrencies, the crypto adoption rate of its citizens was among the highest worldwide.
As per the Crypto Adoption Index, in October 2021, Vietnam surpassed most countries in terms of the overall peer-to-peer transaction value, as well as payments made by individuals. In general, remittances have been representing the majority share of Vietnam’s GDP, which might have helped early cryptocurrency to gain a strong foothold in the country.