New York Introduces New Bill That Allows Crypto Payments

By Kevin • January 30, 2023 3:53 pm • Comments

More and more states within the United States are starting to push for bills that will increase adoption of cryptocurrencies.

One of those states is New York and a state senator just recently introduced a new bill that would make crypto assets a legal form of payment for state agencies.

Essentially, all New York State agencies would be able to accept crypto as a form of payment and this would include a variety of different options such as Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash.

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If the bill passes, it may eventually lead to the acceptance of many other crypto tokens as well such as XRP and XLM which would make the state one of the first adopters of crypto for government operations.

The bill was introduced on January 26 and it is expected to face off some opposition given the fact that the crypto industry has just gone through some events that may have caused it to have a “risky” reputation.

Watcher.guru reports:

Earlier this week saw Arizona attempt to introduce a bill that made Bitcoin, and other cryptos, legal tender in the state. Now, New York has followed suit, with a bill being introduced to the senate to make cryptocurrencies an acceptable form of payment in state agencies.

Specifically, the legislation states that the act will, “amend the state finance law, in relation to allowing New York state agencies to accept cryptocurrencies as a form of payment.”

Moreover, the legal document expresses the definition of cryptocurrencies and the guidelines between those digital assets and state agencies.

Conclusively, the bill states that “Each state agency is authorized to enter into an agreement with persons to provide the acceptance, by offices of the state, of cryptocurrency as a means of payment of fines, civil penalties, rent, rates, taxes,” and more civil duties. The bill is set to change the very landscape of integrated digital assets in one of America’s largest cities.

It is important to note that there are many uses cases where people would have to pay state agencies.

Example use cases include things such as rent, taxes, fines, civic penalties, and much more which means that there would be many opportunities for people to use crypto for these payments.

If it turns out that this is a success and more people are willing to make payments because of this, it could potentially serve as a good example that may convince many other states to start to do the same.

In order for the bill to actually pass, it will need to be passed by both the NY Senate as well as the New York Assembly.

Finally, it will have to be signed by the NY State Governor Kathy Hochul so there may be some time before such a bill could take effect.

CoinTelegraph concludes:

The bill defines “cryptocurrency” as “any form of digital currency in which encryption techniques are used to regulate the generation of units of currency […] Including but not limited to, bitcoin, ethereum, litecoin and bitcoin cash.”

Depending on how this definition is interpreted, it may or may not include stablecoins like USD Coin.

On the one hand, the supply of stablecoins is usually regulated by the issuer instead of by cryptography.

On the other hand, the bill does recognize that some cryptocurrencies have an “issuer,” and it provides that agencies can charge the payor an extra fee if such a fee is charged by the cryptocurrency’s issuer.

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