The Republic of Marshall Islands has just announced that it will be releasing a digital token (the SOV) that will function as legal tender. It is the first cryptocurrency to be elevated to that status.
2018 has seen a flurry of activity from national governments trying to carve their position vis-a-vis the blockchain movement. I’ve put together a list below.
What this amounts to is a world scale experiment in the macroeconomics of crypto. Oversimplifying a bit, the motivations for how countries are getting formally involved fall into two buckets:
Attracting Talent & Capital
There is a simple formula for being a rich region: attract the most talented wealth creators. This is why California would be the world’s 6th largest economy if independent and the SF Bay Area is growing at 3x the national economic average. Perhaps the leading motivation for the companies who have announced crypto programs and policies is to make themselves attractive for a new class of highly dynamic, fast moving entrepreneurs who are more decoupled from physical locations than ever.
Raising Capital
Just like the companies selling tokens en lieu of or alongside traditional fundraising, there are some countries who are actually using national token sales as a sort of alternative to traditional taxation.
So, does it matter?
On the one hand, there is a bit of opportunism around some of these moves. On the other, at the very core of the blockchain movement is a democratic notion that old ways of organizing the world are not immutable, and that people get to vote with their money, their attention, and their feet to align themselves with the communities that best reflect their vision for themselves and the world.
True personal and professional global mobility is deeply routed in the generation of entrepreneurs driving crypto. They already fancy themselves global citizens, are comfortable living everywhere and nowhere at once, and tend not to scared of but in fact thrive on radical change.
There’s no reason at all to think that some of that won’t make its way to where people decide to set up shop.
Nation-Scale Crypto Experiments
Republic Of Marshall Islands | Releasing the SOV token which will function as legal tender and help the country raise money for healthcare, climate, and more https://cryptocomes.com/republic-marshall-islands-first-country-declare-cryptocurrency-legal-tender
Switzerland | Switzerland is being hella Switzerland and trying to bring order and process by issuing ICO guidelines, while still being an extremely safe and business friendly environment for crypto companies – https://usethebitcoin.com/switzerland-issues-guidelines-order-start-icos-become-cryptonation/
Malta | Trying to pioneer business friendly regulations for blockchain tech and organizing community around major “Malta Blockchain Summit” – https://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20180225/technology/Positioning-Malta-as-a-blockchain-destination.671732
Spain | The ruling party is actively bringing in crypto experts to promote blockchain to the Spanish parliament and trying to design tax breaks for crypto investments https://71republic.com/2018/02/20/spain-tax-breaks-blockchain/
Portugal | Portugal has announced that personal income taxation will not apply to gains from cryptocurrency, saying that to do so would run counter to the countries disinterest in “cross-border taxes” https://cointelegraph.com/news/why-are-portuguese-increasingly-excited-about-cryptocurrency-trading-expert-blog
Estonia | No stranger to the tech globalist game, Estonia is trying to extend their e-residency program into the crypto era, with a set of proposals to use blockchain for everything from digitally signing docs to smart contracts to token-backed use of the Euro https://phys.org/news/2018-01-estonia-token-effort-euro-crypto.html
Puerto Rico | With a recent NYTimes article and the upcoming Puerto Crypto conference, Puerto Rico is sort of ground zero for the actual no-BS application of crypto people moving to be in a more business friendly environment. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/02/technology/cryptocurrency-puerto-rico.html
Venezuela | Then there’s Venezuela. Thank goodness we have them and their oil-backed “Petro” token to show us all, in a sea of thoughtful well-intentioned national programs, what it looks like to make a baldfaced kleptocratic grab to prop up a failing regime and give everyone else a bad name. https://cointelegraph.com/news/these-guys-just-need-money-what-do-venezuelan-users-think-of-the-petro
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