The Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman discloses India’s plan to develop standard operating procedures for cryptocurrency during its G20 presidency for the next year, from Dec 1, 2022, to Nov 30, 2023. Underling this, the minister said, all countries want to contain the technology but not be misused.

Citing the risks to financial stability, Sitharamn has earlier asked for international collaboration to work towards the future of crypto and has asked to be cautious against following the crypto trend. However, She confirmed to a group of Indian reporters on Saturday, “That (crypto) will also be part of India’s thing (agenda during G20 presidency)” before concluding her trip to Washington DC to attend the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

As per the finance minister, a country alone cannot handle or regulate crypto. She further pointed out the use of crypto assets in money laundering as exposed by Enforcement Directorate,  India’s law enforcement agency. Members of the G20 have also accepted the fact that to effectively regulate crypto assets, the participation of all the countries is required. 

All the countries and institutions associated with G20 or the World Bank are doing their own research studies and analysis concerning crypto assets and decentralized currencies, the Minister said, “We would definitely want to collate all this and do a bit of study and then bring it on to the table of the G-20 so that members can discuss it and hopefully arrive at a framework or SOP so that globally, countries can have a technology-driven regulatory framework.”

She further said, “But implicit in this is that we don’t want the technology to be disturbed. We want the technology to survive and also be in a position for the FinTech and other sectors to benefit from it.”

“This concern has been actually acknowledged by several members of the G20 saying yes money trail, yes money laundering, yes drug misuse, and so on. There is an understanding that we need to have some kind of regulation, and that all the countries will have to be true together on it, no one country is going to be able to singularly handle it. So on that, we will certainly have something,” Ms. Sitharaman said.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), in July, already asked to prohibit cryptocurrency over their concerns over the decentralized currency’s destabilizing effect on monetary and fiscal stability.

Nirmala said, “In view of the concerns expressed by the RBI on the destabilizing effect of cryptocurrencies on the monetary and fiscal stability of a country, the RBI has recommended framing of legislation on this sector. The RBI is of the view that cryptocurrencies should be prohibited.” 

In the first week of October, the reserve Bank of India shared a Concept Note for central bank digital currency (CBDC), they mentioned a list of features and the reasons for developing its own centralized digital currency.