A number of recent decisions in the English courts, combined with a recent legal statement by the UK Jurisdiction Taskforce (“UKJT”), have clarified the legal status of cryptoassets (such as Bitcoin). This clarification has important implications for real-world situations involving cryptoassets with which commercial parties and the English courts are increasingly having to grapple.
In this client alert, we focus on the decision in AA v Persons Unknown from earlier this year1. This decision, which includes an analysis of the UKJT’s conclusions, provides the most detailed consideration of the legal status of cryptoassets by the English courts to date.
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1[2019] EWHC 3556 Comm. The hearing was held in private in December 2019 and the judgment was not released for publication until earlier this year.
