It was announced yesterday that New Zealand has become the first country ever to legalize salary payments in cryptocurrency.
This ruling was signed on June 27 by the Inland Revenue Department (IRD) agency’s Director of Public Rulings, Susan Price. It will be put into effect for three years from September 1, 2019. The ruling states that the digital currency paid must be pegged to at least one fiat currency, and must also be able to be converted directly into a standard form of payment.
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The news follows the New Zealand central bank’s decision to slash interest rates, with the possibility that negative interest rates might be introduced, indicating that further capital flight could indeed see an uptake in cryptocurrencies.
In light of the salary payments news, see below expert commentary from New Zealand citizen Dave Hodgson of NEM Ventures, the venture capital and investment arm of the NEM blockchain ecosystem.
Dave Hodgson, Director and Co-Founder of NEM Ventures, the venture capital and investment arm of the NEM blockchain ecosystem, said:
“This is a very positive step for New Zealand - the government is already taking a progressive approach towards Digital Government Services. They are also applying similarly pragmatic steps to integrating crypto into the wider tax and payments systems.
These kinds of assurances as businesses and employees are precisely what the industry has been asking of other jurisdictions for years now. My hope is that this ruling will prompt the remaining D9 to follow a similar approach shortly.
In the fight to attract the best talent to a country, New Zealand is already punching well above its weight and this is yet another ribbon to add to that bow!"
Would you want your salary payments in cryptocurrency? Why yes or not - let us know in the comments section.
