Key Takeaways
- The party’s move is to take crypto investment gains out of the existing savings tax band and fold them directly into the general income bracket
- The change would push the tax rate on sizable crypto profits as high as 47%, compared to the current 30% ceiling.
In a major regulatory development, Spain’s left-wing Sumar coalition party is pushing for a sweeping overhaul of how the country taxes and regulates cryptocurrencies, introducing a set of amendments that could potentially reshape obligations for both individual investors and companies operating in the sector.
The proposals — filed as part of Spain’s legislative process to implement the EU’s MiCA framework — seek to modify three major laws: the General Tax Law, the Income Tax Law, and the Inheritance and Gift Tax Law. If approved, they would mark one of the most significant shifts in Spain’s approach to digital assets to date.
At the center of Sumar’s plan is a move to take crypto investment gains out of the existing savings tax band and fold them directly into the general income bracket. The change would push the tax rate on sizable crypto profits as high as 47%, compared to the current 30% ceiling. Corporate holders would face a flat 30% rate on gains connected to virtual assets.
The package also introduces a novel consumer-protection requirement: a mandatory “risk traffic light” system built and supervised by the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV). Under the rule, crypto platforms would be required to display visual risk indicators tied to key metrics such as whether a project is registered, supervised, backed by reserves, or has sufficient liquidity.
Further, the party also plans to classify all cryptocurrencies as assets that can be attached and seized by authorities.
The development comes amid Spain’s tax agency has already been expanding its scrutiny of digital asset activity. It issued 328,000 warning notices over crypto-related taxes for the 2022 fiscal year, and then nearly doubled that number the following year, sending 620,000 similar notices.
The amendments now enter the political negotiation stage, where they will face resistance from industry groups, tax specialists, and potentially other parties in parliament.