TL;DR: Les Echos, the oldest daily news organization in France, reported a regional commercial court ruled cryptocurrencies like BTC and bitcoin cash (BCH) are the equivalents of fiat money. The decision comes in relation to a lending dispute involving a cryptocurrency exchange and an investment company.

Vive la France! Commercial Court Equates Crypto & Money

“For the Commercial Court of Nanterre,” reporter Éric Benhamou explained, “bitcoin is a fungible intangible asset. An important decision which should facilitate bitcoin operations and ensure better market liquidity.” The late February decision “will be a date for two reasons: it is a first in France, especially since it comes out of case law usual. Above all, it allows to qualify the legal nature of bitcoin, the most famous and ancient cryptocurrency,” Benhamou detailed, according to Google translate.

Apparently back in 2014, 1,000 BTC were loaned from France-based exchange Paymium to the UK investment firm, BitSpread. BTC then forked in August of 2017, creating BCH, essentially giving BTC holders a new coin for free which now ranks routinely in the top five by market capitalization. The suit is set to determine who owns the BCH, Paymium or BitSpread.

French attorney Hubert de Vauplane noted, “The scope of this decision is considerable because it allows bitcoin to be treated like money or other financial instruments. It will therefore facilitate bitcoin transactions, such as lending or repo transactions, which are growing, and thus favor the liquidity of the cryptocurrency market,” Les Echos quoted.

The actual, practical impact of the French court decision isn’t immediately clear, and crypto enthusiasts are often quick to seize upon such small victories. During fits and spurts of 2018 and 2019, reports out of China made similar claims. When asked by CoinSpice if a 2019 ruling compares to that of a seemingly similar decision back in 2018, Twitter influencer Dovey Wan demurred slightly, “I’m not a legal expert but it seems to me the case today went on a full trial of [a] court, [and] the 2018 case is an arbitration (a settlement process between two parties),” later elaborating, “Hence in all Chinese news coverage said “first court case recognizing Bitcoin as virtual property.”

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DYOR: CoinSpice is your home for just spicy crypto things. We’re not affiliated with any cryptocurrency project or token. Each published piece is intended for information purposes only, not investment advice and not in the hope of impacting speculative markets. There are plenty of trading sites and coin-specific advocacy journals out there, we’re neither. CoinSpice strives for rigorous accuracy in our reporting. Information presented here is contingent usually on a host of factors, and the ecosystem moves fast — prices change, projects change, and at warp speed. Do your own research.

DISCLOSURE: The author holds cryptocurrency as part of his financial portfolio, including BCH.