France postpones 2027 budget vote, crypto exit-tax proposals scrapped

France's wealth exit tax has existed since 2011 and was tightened again in 2019, requiring residents with large unrealized gains in securities to settle a tax bill before relocating abroad. Crypto's rapid growth as a store of wealth made it an obvious target for lawmakers looking to close what they saw as a loophole in that regime, folding digital assets into the same exit-tax logic that already applies to equities and company shares.

Crypto holders in France can now plan a move abroad without a looming bill on paper gains they haven't cashed out, removing a deterrent that worried founders and early investors. The relief is partial: a tax on stablecoin swaps remains in the draft text, so anyone converting bitcoin or ether into USDT or USDC still faces a potential charge, and exchanges serving French clients must keep tracking that exposure while the wider bill stalls. (per thedefiant.io)

Taxing unrealized gains at the border assumes wealth can be pinned down the way a brokerage account can, but crypto is built to move without a registrar's permission, held in a wallet rather than a custodian's ledger. France's retreat on the exit-tax clause concedes that enforcing such a rule against self-custodied assets is harder than against listed shares, a distinction other EU governments drafting similar wealth-exit rules will have to confront. (per crypto.news)

The National Assembly's Nov. 17 deadline for completing the first reading is the next checkpoint: a further postponement would push the revenue section into special procedural tracks that have governed French budgets in past standoffs. Whether the stablecoin-swap tax survives intact, gets amended, or is dropped before that date will determine the one piece of crypto-specific tax policy still live in this year's budget fight.