Legal Status of Bitcoin in Europe (Map)

How Many European Countries have Legalized Bitcoin?

45 European countries have legalized Bitcoin. 3 Countries are neutral on the legal status of Bitcoin. 6 Countries have provided no information on the legal status of Bitcoin. 1 country (Republic of Macedonia) has made bitcoin illegal. The table below shows what the status is within each European country.

Ont thing we for got to check in the original story was what is the Macedonian Denar worth in Bitcoin at the time of writing this edit it is worth 680101.34 Denar. So there is definitely still an exchange of Denar and BTC occurring. We do think Bitcoin Converter is one of the best sites out there for calculating BTC exchange rates.

Country Name Bitcoin Legality Classification
Albania Neutral Commodity
Andorra Neutral No Information
Armenia No Information No Information
Austria Legal Barter Good
Belarus Legal Commodity
Belgium Legal Currency
Bosnia and Herzegovina No Information No Information
Bulgaria Legal Currency
Croatia Legal Currency
Cyprus Legal Currency
Czech Republic Legal Currency
Denmark Legal Currency
Estonia Legal Currency
Finland Legal Currency
France Legal Commodity
Georgia Legal No Classification
Germany Legal Barter Good
Gibraltar Legal No Information
Greece Legal Currency
Greenland Legal Commodity
Guernsey No Information No Information
Vatican City No Information No Information
Hungary Legal Currency
Iceland Legal Currency
Ireland Legal Currency
Isle of Man Legal No Information
Italy Legal Currency
Jersey Legal Currency
Kosovo Neutral No Information
Latvia Legal Currency
Liechtenstein Legal Currency
Lithuania Legal Currency
Luxembourg Legal Currency
Malta Legal Currency
Monaco Legal Currency
Montenegro No Information No Information
Netherlands Legal Commodity
Poland Legal Property
Portugal Legal No
Classification
Republic of Macedonia Illegal No Information
Republic of Moldova No Information No Information
Romania Legal Currency
Russian Federation Legal Currency
San Marino Legal Currency
Serbia Legal Commodity
Slovakia Legal Currency
Slovenia Legal Currency
Spain Legal Currency
Svalbard and Jan Mayen Legal Commodity
Sweden Legal Commodity
Switzerland Legal Currency
Turkey Legal Commodity
Ukraine Legal Currency
United Kingdom Legal Currency

The sea of green in the map and table above highlights that Bitcoin is legal in almost every country in Europe and is currently legal in all 28 member countries of the European Union. What does this mean for Bitcoin? It is here to stay. As of writing this article Bitcoin is on the verge of surpassing USD$8000.00 again.

Bitcoin price
Image from coinmarketcap.com

Bitcoin has been here before. December 2017 it hit USD$19,783.06 then plummeted to under USD$6200.00 by February 2018. So yes, Bitcoin is volatile there is no denying that but what currency hasn’t been volatile at some point in its history? Bitcoin is still in its infancy, for example the USD has been around since 1785 and has had a volatile history. Eventually most currencies settle down and get into a groove and the market begins to trust it.

Judging by how many countries now accept that bitcoin can be exchanged for goods means that the magical trust factor is already starting to solidify around Bitcoin. This is different from Bitcoin being considered legal tender. Most EU member countries only accept the Euro as legal tender (except the UK). However, shops, pubs, petrol stations and more types of establishments are starting to accept Bitcoin as payment in exchange for goods and services and Bitcoin teller machines are sprouting faster than mushrooms after a summer shower.

Why is Bitcoin Illegal in Macedonia?

The Governor of the National Bank of Macedonia, Dimitar Bogov puts it like this:

“In Macedonia, the legal means for payment in cash and non-cash payment operations is the denar,”

This policy is futile. If a person has access to the internet then they have access to Bitcoin. It is suspected that hundreds if not thousands of Bitcoin transactions a week originate from Macedonia. So a subset of the Macedonia population is already circumventing these laws. If Macedonia wants to join the EU at any time in the future, then the denar will have to be dropped and at this point it is widely suspected that Bitcoin will no longer be outlawed. Some commentators that it may become legal long before that anyway.  You can compare this map image to the standard map of Europe.

Will the European Union (EU) Survive Brexit?

What is Brexit?

Brexit is the conjunction of two words Britain and Exit. It was coined by The Economist magazine back in 2012. It describes the anticipated split of Britain from the EU.  Brexit is such a commonly used term that it has been added to the Oxford Dictionary.

Will the EU Survive Without the UK?

Yes, the EU can survive without the UK. The two questions that follow from this are. What kind of EU will remain and what kind of Britain will it be. While it is feasible that the split could cause the EU headaches and some initial teething problems. Eventually the EU will bounce back.

In the short term the statistical data will look bad for the EU. Experts believe that the EU will lose 16% of its GDP when the UK leaves the union. This is a straight out fact as that the is the proportion of GDP that the UK made up of the overall EU economy. The UK is the second biggest economy in the EU, under Germany but above France. So anyway you look at it that is a big statistical value to lose. When the UK leaves the EU economy for the first time since inception of the EU28 (the European Union with 28 member countries) will be smaller than the USA economy.

The flip side to this coin is that the UK since about 2007 has been a drag on the EU economy. Economic growth in the EU without the UK will actually be faster. The UK economy has been relatively stagnant since the (GFC) Global Financial Crisis. London’s financial markets were proven to be very vulnerable to the affects of the GFC and have not recovered well. The UK’s manufacturing and exports are predicted to grow slower than the EU in 2019 and 2020, so the overall effect on the EU economy of Brexit will be a positive one. Even if initially the numbers will look worse.

The European Union after Brexit will be a very different beast but probably a more robust, strong and progressive animal.

Will the UK Survive Without the EU?

Yes, the UK can survive without the EU. The UK economy is  the 5th largest in the world. This is despite all the pains the UK economy suffered over the GFC. The UK government is attempting  forge ahead with new trade pacts with countries like Australia but at the end of the day the EU is the UK’s biggest trading partner. this is not likely to change for decades to come. How will Brexit affect trade? The will be determined by the trade deal the Uk parliament can put in place with the EU. Currently they are not having much success in putting an kind of agreement on paper that is both acceptable to the UK parliament and the member countries of the EU. If this isn’t sorted then Initially trade will take a hit and possibly have a long term negative affect.

Conclusion

Brexit is a force for change in the world. Both the EU and the UK will initially feel some negative affects from the split but will these effects be long lasting? Only time will tell.

Top 40 European Economies By GDP 2018

Top 40 European Economies 2018

Here we have a table of the top 40 European countries ranked by Gross Domestic Product. This doesn’t only include European Union Countries but all the countries that are considered part of the continent of Europe.

Some interesting takeaways from this years European GDP figures are the following:

  • Romania went up one place to become the 16th largest economy in the European Union (EU) in 2017. In the full list of countries that are considered part of Europe it is at 19th place.
  • Russia is still going backwards but that doesn’t seem to be affecting president Putin’s popularity. he won the election easily.
  • The Czech Republic is still growing strong, it also surpassed Greece in 2017 but this was largely expected unlike Romania.
  • Balkan countries like Croatia that have been hit rather hard in the last few years seem to be on their way to recovery.
2018 Rank Country 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
1st  Germany 3,761.142 3,545.946 3,753.687 3,885.440 3,365.293 3,494.898 3,684.816 4,211.635
2nd  United Kingdom 2,611.108 2,655.458 2,721.489 2,945.394 2,858.482 2,649.893 2,624.529 2,936.286
3rd  France 2,865.304 2,682.900 2,809.390 2,843.673 2,420.163 2,488.284 2,583.560 2,925.096
4th  Italy 2,278.376 2,073.972 2,130.997 2,141.937 1,815.759 1,858.913 1,937.894 2,181.970
5th  Russia 2,031.768 2,170.145 2,230.624 2,030.973 1,326.016 1,267.754 1,527.469 1,719.900
6th  Spain 1,489.381 1,340.689 1,369.690 1,383.537 1,199.715 1,252.163 1,313.951 1,506.439
7th  Netherlands 894.576 829.406 866.951 881.033 750.696 769.930 825.745 945.327
8th   Switzerland 696.528 665.898 685.871 712.050 664.603 651.770 678.575 741.688
9th  Poland 524.104 496.687 526.031 546.644 474.893 473.501 524.886 614.190
10th  Sweden 563.110 543.881 579.526 570.137 492.618 512.748 538.575 600.771
11th  Belgium 528.721 499.129 524.970 534.672 454.687 465.248 494.733 562.229
12th  Austria 429.493 407.801 428.456 437.123 374.124 387.299 416.845 477.672
13th  Norway 498.157 509.705 522.349 500.244 389.482 366.873 396.457 443.252
14th  Ireland 237.990 222.089 232.150 246.438 238.031 254.596 333.994 385.142
15th  Denmark 341.498 322.277 335.878 340.806 294.951 301.784 324.484 369.760
16th  Finland 273.925 256.849 268.281 271.165 229.671 234.578 253.244 289.557
17th  Czech Republic 227.307 206.751 208.796 205.658 181.858 185.269 213.189 251.577
18th  Portugal 245.120 216.488 224.983 230.012 199.077 205.085 218.064 248.891
19th  Romania 186.113 172.041 191.598 199.950 177.315 181.944 211.315 245.590
20th  Greece 289.068 249.663 242.306 238.023 195.320 194.594 200.690 226.774
21st  Hungary 139.447 126.825 133.424 137.104 120.636 117.729 132.034 163.541
22nd  Ukraine 163.307 175.707 179.572 130.660 90.524 83.550 109.321 119.134
23rd  Slovakia 97.621 92.799 97.743 99.971 86.629 89.797 95.938 111.483
24th  Luxembourg 59.010 56.323 60.150 62.395 57.423 60.176 62.393 72.461
25th  Bulgaria 55.799 52.613 54.517 55.837 48.957 49.364 56.943 64.781
26th  Croatia 62.172 56.484 57.849 57.159 48.850 49.928 54.516 61.056
27th  Belarus 59.735 63.615 71.710 76.139 54.609 45.887 54.436 59.246
28th  Slovenia 51.299 46.288 48.005 49.506 42.768 43.791 48.868 56.933
29th  Lithuania 43.478 42.828 46.426 48.232 41.267 43.024 47.263 54.352
30th  Serbia 46.488 40.749 45.520 43.866 36.513 37.381 41.471 48.279
31st  Latvia 28.488 28.343 30.838 31.970 27.048 28.177 30.319 35.915
32nd  Estonia 22.824 22.673 24.888 25.953 22.704 23.476 25.973 30.821
33rd  Iceland 14.666 14.183 15.330 16.693 16.718 18.633 23.909 29.109
34th  Bosnia and Herzegovina 18.318 16.906 17.852 17.977 15.794 16.324 18.058 20.340
35th  Albania 12.891 12.345 12.916 13.262 11.543 12.269 13.181 15.289
36th  Malta 9.604 9.289 10.056 10.582 9.801 10.341 12.543 14.873
37th  Macedonia 10.659 9.751 10.774 11.342 9.922 10.424 11.366 13.085
38th  Moldova 7.018 7.283 7.985 7.944 6.414 6.084 8.085 9.202
39th  Montenegro 4.500 4.048 4.419 4.462 4.039 4.182 4.764 5.547
40th  San Marino 2.056 1.802 1.802 1.786 1.566 1.569 1.636 1.809