The UK has formally recognized cryptocurrencies and other digital assets as personal property in a historic overhaul of property law. The new Property Act 2025, which received royal assent this week, clarifies that digital assets, such as cryptocurrencies and stablecoins, can enjoy the same legal protections as traditional property.
In a speech to the House of Lords on Tuesday, Lord Speaker John McFall said the Property Bill had received royal assent from King Charles, officially making it law. That means, crypto users will be subjected to the same rights and protections as those who own traditional forms of property, such as physical property, stocks, or intellectual property.
UK law will simplify ownership cases and facilitate stolen asset recovery
Under the current English and Welsh law, personal property generally falls into two categories: “things in possession” (examples are physical objects, like cars or jewellery) and “things in action” (intangible rights, such as debts).
But digital assets — including cryptocurrencies, non-fungible tokens (NFTs), stablecoins, and potentially other electronic “things” — did not fit neatly into either category. The new law changes that, establishing a third category: digital or electronic things, which may be regarded as personal property.
As the statute states, a “thing (including a thing that is digital or electronic in nature)” is not automatically excluded from being personal property solely because it does not fall into the traditional possession-or-action categories.
Freddie New, who heads policy at Bitcoin Policy UK and is the CEO of B HODL, views the new property law as a tremendous boon for Bitcoin users throughout the UK.
Moreover, after the announcement of the bill’s enactment, the advocacy group CryptoUK gave similar remarks. It stated, “UK courts have already treated digital assets as property, but that was all through case-by-case judgments. Parliament has now written this principle into law. This gives digital assets a much clearer legal footing — especially for things like proving ownership, recovering stolen assets, and handling them in insolvency or estate cases. That’s why today matters.”
Under UK law, personal property is either a tangible object you can possess or an intangible right you can enforce. Nonetheless, the new law says digital possessions can still be considered personal property, even if they don’t appear to belong to either category.
According to the Law Commission’s 2024 report, digital assets exhibit both aspects of both forms of property. Researchers have also found that the lagging legal categorization of such assets has significantly slowed down litigation.
About 12% of adults in the UK owned crypto assets in 2024
In another post on X, CryptoUK stated that the new legislation has created clearer protections for consumers and investors, with crypto holders being given a level of certainty similar to that of traditional property holders. It argued that digital assets are now securely owned, recoverable in the event of theft or fraud, and can be included in insolvency and inheritance procedures.
The law lays a strong legal groundwork for crypto ownership and transfer, which would allow the UK to promote better innovation of financial products, real-world asset tokenization, and secure digital markets, it added.
Community members also claimed that for private investors, the property law secures their digital wealth, providing legal certainty and stability for companies related to cryptocurrency.
According to the UK’s finance regulator, around 12% of adults owned crypto as of late last year, up from 10% previously. The government also announced in April that it would develop a regulatory system for crypto firms, aligning them more closely with traditional finance rules and enhancing the UK’s global standing in the sector.
On related developments, the UK’s financial regulator has decided not to investigate Rachel Reeves and the Treasury over pre-budget briefings immediately, but left the door open for further examination of what the Conservatives claimed amounted to market manipulation.
In a letter addressed to the chair of the Treasury committee, Meg Hillier, the chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), said the regulator had turned down requests by politicians, including the shadow chancellor, Mel Stride, to open an inquiry into briefings made before last week’s announcement by the chancellor.
Nikhil Rathi said the FCA had “not commenced an enforcement investigation” into potential market abuse, but added that the regulator would consider the findings of a Treasury inquiry into pre-budget leaks.
“We have requested details of this work and that the outcome, including the inquiry into any leak of market-sensitive or inside information relating to the budget, is shared with us so we can consider as appropriate,” the FCA said. The 2025 budget was preceded by several narratives about what was being considered, including the revelation a few days beforehand that Reeves had abruptly dropped a plan to raise income tax rates.
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