Hetmantsev denied the possibility of legalizing corruption proceeds through the law on cryptocurrencies
Head of the Parliamentary Committee on Finance, Tax and Customs Policy, Danylo Hetmantsev refuted there are widespread assumptions about the possible use of the draft law on virtual assets as a tool for legalizing the illegal income of officials.
According to him, such fears are groundless. Hetmantsev reminded that all officials are required to declare their property and sources of income, and concealment of assets or inability to explain their origin is punishable under the Criminal Code.
“If an official or deputy declares a cryptocurrency that is not in his previous declarations, he will probably sit down. If he can’t explain where he got the income to buy cryptocurrency from, too”Hetmantsev emphasized.
The draft law on virtual assets has already been reviewed by the specialized committee and recommended for the first reading in the Verkhovna Rada. The document does not recognize cryptocurrencies as an official means of payment in Ukraine and divides them into three categories: tokens tied to assets, electronic money and other types of virtual assets.
As of 2024, according to the data, the number of declarations in which cryptocurrency appears increased by 10% compared to the previous year and reached 2,113. Most often, such assets are declared by representatives of law enforcement agencies. The most common cryptocurrencies among civil servants remain Tether, Bitcoin and Ethereum: 802 declarations with USDT, 731 with BTC and 713 with ETH. Ripple, Binance Coin, Solana and Dogecoin are also frequently mentioned.
Among the record holders is Oleg Bondarenko, the head of the parliamentary committee on environmental policy, who declared 80 bitcoins (equivalent to UAH 279.4 million). Deputy Serhiy Maizel declared 200 Ethereum tokens (15.5 million hryvnias), and Vitaly Brovko from the Prosecutor General’s Office declared 847,908 USDT worth more than 35 million hryvnias.
