The Board of Control for Cricket in India sent a 68-page advisory to the Women’s Premier League teams, specifying the activities which couldn’t be advertised. In the document, cryptocurrencies were mentioned along with the gambling and tobacco industries.
This follows a previous ban for the men’s cricket Premier League, introduced back in 2022. Before the ban, the Indian Premier League had collaborated at least with two local crypto exchanges , CoinSwitch Kuber and CoinDCX. Coincidentally, in March 2022, the crypto businesses decided not to advertise in the Premier League due to responsibility concerns.
Home to an estimated 115 million cryptocurrency investors, in 2022, India introduced two laws demanding crippling taxes on crypto-related unrealized gains and transactions and requiring its citizens to pay a 30% tax on unrealized crypto gains.
Some investors expected a change this year to ease the pressure on the crypto sector, but the national budget for 2023 didn’t deliver. The country’s finance minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, believes in a global regulatory framework on crypto, which is why the Indian crypto regulatory regime is unlikely to shift autonomously.
