Rental car owner arrested for taking payment in crypto

An Indonesian rental car owner was arrested by Bali police at his business premises after it was alleged he accepted crypto for payments.

It has always been so, that anyone who uses anything else other than a government-backed currency to make a transaction is considered to have broken the law, and is normally heavily sanctioned compared to other far more heinous crimes, depending on the country in which they reside.

In this particular case, police in Bali carried out an undercover operation in order to expose the illegal transactions that were being made, i.e., taking payments in crypto in exchange for car rentals.

The police set up the car rental owner by first infiltrating a Telegram group and then asked the suspect for a wallet address for crypto payment. In a subsequent meeting to finalise the deal the business owner was arrested and his mobile phone was seized as well as other possessions.

If proven guilty, the punishment meted out by Indonesian courts for such an offence is up to one year in prison, and a fine of IDR 200 million (US$13,337).

According to Coconuts Bali, Nanang Prihasmoko, the Bali Crime Investigation Unit Chief, said of the incident:

“We encourage the use of the Indonesian rupiah because it is the only currency in Indonesia, and we must conduct transactions with it,”

Opinion

On the face of it, requiring citizens to transact in the officially recognised currency of the land appears to be not only sensible but laudable, given that the use of other, non-official currencies, can take away from the official currency, and over time confidence in it can erode.

However, as the following chart demonstrates, the Indonesian rupiah is not maintaining its value. The chart is for the price of gold in kilograms against the Indonesian rupiah over the last 15 years. It can be seen that the rupiah has fallen around 400% to gold in this time.

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Author: Laurie Dunn

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