According to one source, Uzbekistan will never alter its plan to ban cryptocurrency payments in late 2019.
According to a central bank official, the Republic of Uzbekistan will never accept cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC) as a payment option. Behzod Khamraev, deputy head of the Central Bank of Uzbekistan (CBU), warned that local authorities will never allow locals to use Bitcoin as a form of payment, claiming that BTC is worthless.
Khamraev stated in an interview with local business website Spot.uz that Bitcoin is commonly seen as “speculative” and would never be equal to fiat currencies such as the US dollar, euro, Japanese yen, or Russian ruble.
According to the official, there are around 28 trillion Uzbekistani soms in circulation, all of which are backed by the central bank’s assets.
“On the banknotes, there is even a notation concerning the regulator’s requirements, whereas cryptocurrency is not backed by anything,” Khamraev remarked. The official’s remarks come shortly after El Salvador became the world’s first country to accept Bitcoin as legal tender alongside the US dollar on September 7.
In late 2019, the director of the National Agency for Project Management (NAPM) under the president of the Republic of Uzbekistan issued an order prohibiting residents from making payments in cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. The decree stated that “crypto-assets cannot be used as a way of making or receiving payments on the territory of the Republic of Uzbekistan.”
The NAPM recommended legalizing cryptocurrency trading in Uzbekistan in April 2021, allowing residents to swap crypto assets for national and foreign currencies. In late 2019, the authorities previously prohibited its residents from purchasing cryptocurrencies. The CBU and NAPM did not respond promptly to Cointelegraph’s request for comment.
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