Court ruling considering crypto as property is a paradigm shift for the Indian market: SB Seker, APAC Head, Binance

How does the Madras High Court ruling considering crypto as a property boost your initiatives or plans in terms of India?

From our perspective, it is a welcome decision as it provides clarity on the legal characterization of digital assets. It is not legal tender, at least not yet. When it comes to ownership, transparency becomes a whole bundle of rights associated with ownership. Transferability, enforceability, ownership, exclusivity, etc. This is a paradigm shift because it also enlivens users’ rights over these properties and we are already seeing some of that happening in the marketplace. It doesn’t change our strategic thinking because we treat digital assets as property when it comes to our consumers. That’s why we have a duty to make it safe for them. So it makes it clear that our thinking is now synonymous with India’s approach from a legal basis.

How do you see the compliance regulations in India at the moment? How would you like it to be changed?

Currently it is an AML registration. India remains the exception among the G2G countries that have committed to financial inclusion and digital asset adoption as part of their national frameworks by 2023. What would help is if the licensing framework offered much more clarity. There are several models around the world. The schools of thought are aligning: figuring out licensing for infrastructure providers and whether it’s a broker-dealer model, an exchange license, an OTC desk licensing model.

Are you planning to rent or work in an office in India?

We are a foreign entity registered with the FIU. We are interested in localization, but it requires many considerations, including regulatory certainty. So one thing we’re looking forward to is seeing how India decides to move beyond its AML registration model to a full licensing model, because that helps us understand what we can do in the market and where we can scale. We would be very interested in expanding our footprint and presence in India. We want to work with the states and be present in parts of the country. What we could use some help with is regulatory certainty.

What is Binance’s plan for India and Maharashtra?

India and APAC as a whole are an important energy region for us. It contributes an inordinate amount of annual growth when it comes to digital assets. About 60 to 70 percent of the growth comes from this part of the world. India is taking the lead. Our strategy for India is the same as our global strategy. In India, there is a uniform adoption against tier 1, 2 and 3 cities. It is still a bit skewed when it comes to gender participation and we want to actively look at that and improve it.

Maharashtra has announced an ambitious timeline, working towards tokenization of real-world assets and digitalization of land titles. We would like to contribute in terms of our know-how in application use, broken down into a safe product life cycle. It is clear what the rights are, and also scalable in a resilient way.

You worked with Kyrgyzstan on stablecoins. Are you also thinking of something like this for India?

Yes, if there is an opportunity in India to collaborate with a regional or central government on their stablecoin initiatives. By stablecoins I mean a broad category including INR-backed tokens, INR-based CBDCs, private-public partnerships in terms of INR-based stablecoins. These are just different mechanisms with unique trade-offs, but we would be interested in any of these methodologies to digitize the rupee, increase market inflow share and internationalization in a programmable and interoperable model. Stablecoins will be a dominant driver of digital asset adoption for the next billion users, along with real-world asset tokenization. These are the two drivers that we focus on as a company.