Bitcoin Prices Fall on Reports India Is Proposing a Crypto Tax

Investing.com – Bitcoin prices fell on Thursday amid reports that India is proposing a crypto tax in the form of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

Bitcoin prices fell on Thursday as India is reportedly proposing a crypto tax in the form of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

Bitcoin was trading at $7,655.3 by 12:20AM ET (04:20GMT) on the Bitfinex exchange, down 4.2% over the previous 24 hours.

Cryptocurrencies that are ““facilitating transactions like supply, transfer, storage, accounting, among others, will be treated as services” and will also receive the 18% crypto tax in India, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing anonymous sources. Exchanges and miners would also be considered taxable, and the levy could be applied retroactively to all trades that took place on or after July 1, 2017, Bloomberg added.

The news follows a move by the Indian government to try to ban crypto purchases from banking institutes in April.

Meanwhile, U.S.-based Coinbase announced on Wednesday that it would acquire trading platform Paradex, which would be integrated into the company in the coming weeks, according to a statement.

"This will significantly enhance the proposition for our customers in terms of what they want to trade and how they want to trade it," said Asiff Hirji, Coinbase president and chief operating officer.

The move comes as Coinbase is reportedly planning to launch its own exchange in the second half of 2023.

In other news, Ethereum, the world’s second largest cryptocurrency by market cap, fell 6.7% to $601.02 on the Bitfinex exchange.

Ripple’s XRP token rose 5.4% higher to $0.60869 on the Poloniex exchange.

Finally, Litecoin was down 5.4% to $120.82.