Crypto exchange Coinbase prepares India office despite impending ban

Despite India’s impending cryptocurrency ban, United States-based cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase is preparing to launch operations in India. In its blog post, Coinbase announced that it is setting up operations in India, with plans to open its first office in Hyderabad.

To benefit from India’s world-class engineering talent pool, Coinbase is currently preparing to launch some IT services in India, including engineering, software development, and customer support operations.

Coinbase said it looks forward to finding world-class talent to help Coinbase develop new ways for its customers to interact with the crypto economy.

Although new Indian employees can choose to work in various regions in India, Coinbase still hopes to establish a physical office for Indian employees in Hyderabad first, as soon as COVID-related policies allow.

In early February, the Indian government was ready to start implementing ban-related policies to quickly ban the operation of private cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin in the country. The cabinet proposed a bill on "Regulations on Cryptocurrency and Official Digital Currency" at the time and continued to track the progress of the bill, hoping to formulate relevant laws within a month after the bill is passed. The bill aims to ban private cryptocurrencies while creating a framework for official digital currencies issued by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the central bank of India.

In India, regulators and the government have been skeptical of cryptocurrencies and concerned about the risks associated with the growing popularity of private digital currencies, virtual currencies and cryptocurrencies.

According to BitPush, conflicting messages came out of India last week about how the country’s authorities treat digital assets. Reuters quoted anonymous government officials as saying that the government would “propose a law to ban cryptocurrencies and impose fines on anyone trading in the country or even holding such digital assets.” But later that day, Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman seemed to sidestep those comments, saying that India would still have a “window” for Bitcoin.

The Supreme Court of India on March 4 overturned a ban by the Reserve Bank of India that prohibited banks from facilitating banking transactions for cryptocurrency exchanges and traders, thus removing a major obstacle to the development of the industry. The ban was imposed by the Reserve Bank of India in April 2018 and came into effect in July 2018.