Which is the best country to open a crypto trading exchange?
Among such countries as USA, Denmark, Estonia, Sweden and Malta I would also mention Finland.
"Suomen Pankki" (SP) (Finland's Central Bank) may be considered a hero role model for other EU financial watchdogs to follow. Not only its officials have been closely monitoring crypto-currencies market for years, gradually deepening their understanding of decentralized digital money environment, but also bank's official statements are remarkably different in its measured and thoughtful tonality from wild, almost maniacal crypto-hunt reports issued by some EU financial institutions.
For example, in January 2014, in the wake of anti-crypto-mania SP published on its web-page the following testimony, which was surreptitiously named "Bitcoin involves risks". Sure, as any other government backed, coercive, centralized financial gatekeeper, which job is to preserve the stability of the current fractional reserve monetary system, SP is far from being "pro-Bitcoin" in it.
Still, when SP's communique says, for instance - "Use of Bitcoin does, however, involve risks for the user, and its value vis-a-vis official currencies has fluctuated significantly." and "The value of a virtual currency is based on supply and demand only. Authorities or other public bodies are not responsible for the purchasing power or stability of Bitcoin, and it can lose its value." that sound like reasonable, although, negative statements, which, however, do not try to invoke readers' fear or to speculate on public ignorance.
There's no surprise, then, that Finland today possesses one of the most crypto-friendly legal environment on the planet. Even though Finnish tax authorities fully tax all profits derived from crypto-transactions, virtual currencies are exempt from VAT. Additionally, you are not require to obtain a special banking license or to follow KYC rules in order to run a local crypto-broker. As usual, government's friendly approach to crypto-businesses is gratified by the surge of entrepreneurial activity in the country. For example, Finland, among other big technological companies, already harbors World's biggest P2P Bitcoin exchange.
Business Notes for Startups Founders:
political climate: friendly;
economic climate: moderately friendly;
regions to focus: locally;
industries to focus: e-commerce, marketplaces, SaaS, FinTech and e-games;
major limitations: slow economic recovery (GDP growth rate is 3%), relatively small economy, very high taxes (personal income tax exceeds 50%), high costs;
stimulus: high-income population, well developed infrastructure (fixed Internet penetration rate at almost 100%);
opportunities: to create an e-business aimed at young generation of urban mobile Internet users in such sectors as FinTech, e-games and entertainments.
Cryptocurrencies and ICOs (outlook): legal (positive) .
The author: Svyatoslav (Svet) Sedov
Angel investor and founder of The First International Incubator for Silicon Valley Companies (FirstInternational.In) in the Bay Area, CA, USA.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SvjatoslavSedof