Is crypto legal in Chile? Rules & regulation (2026)

Chile formally signed the CARF Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (CARF-MCAA), committing to automatic exchange of crypto-asset transaction data with partner jurisdictions beginning with the 2026 data year (first exchanges in 2027). This extends the OECD AEOI framework to cover VASPs and effectively ends crypto tax opacity for cross-border holdings.

Under UAF Circular 62, registered VASPs must collect and transmit full sender and receiver identity data for cryptocurrency transfers of USD 1,000 or more, ending anonymity for threshold-crossing transactions and fully aligning Chile with FATF Recommendation 16.

Chile's Corte Suprema rejected the final appeal by Buda.com, CryptoMKT, and OrionX, confirming that banks were individually justified under AML risk management in closing exchange accounts and had not colluded. The ruling closed a 7-year legal saga and entrenched the risk-based banking approach toward crypto firms absent a court-imposed duty to serve.

Chile's Financial Analysis Unit (UAF) issued Circular 62, systematising all AML/CFT obligations for supervised entities, including virtual asset service providers, with stricter KYC, continuous transaction monitoring, and suspicious-activity reporting requirements aligned with updated FATF standards; main provisions took effect 1 June 2025.

The CMF refined General Rule 502 to clarify obligations for natural persons acting on behalf of authorised entities and introduced differentiated compliance thresholds for social-media investment advisors based on follower count, tightening oversight of the growing retail crypto advisory market.

General Rule 502 translated the Fintech Law into enforceable compliance thresholds, mandatory CMF registration, governance standards, minimum capital, and AML/CFT controls, for all financial service providers including crypto exchanges and custodians; incumbents had until 3 February 2025 to register.

The Tribunal de Defensa de la Libre Competencia rejected claims by Buda.com, CryptoMKT, and OrionX that BancoEstado, Banco de Chile, Itaú, Scotiabank, and Santander had colluded to exclude them, ruling that each bank's account closure was an independent, AML-justified decision rather than coordinated anticompetitive conduct.

Chile's Internal Revenue Service (SII) formally ruled that buying and selling crypto-assets is not subject to VAT because they are intangible goods; capital gains from trading remain taxable under general income-tax rules, cementing the pre-existing interpretive treatment and reducing uncertainty for exchanges.

Law 21.521 ('Ley Fintec'), published in the Official Gazette on 4 January 2023 and in force from 3 February 2023, created Chile's first comprehensive statutory framework for digital assets: defining crypto-assets as a regulated category, mandating VASP registration with the CMF, and enabling the CMF to set prudential, operational, and consumer-protection standards.

Chile's Corte Suprema upheld BancoEstado's closure of OrionX's accounts, overturning an earlier precautionary injunction; the ruling signalled that banks retained discretion to terminate crypto-firm accounts on AML grounds absent a dedicated regulatory framework, leaving exchanges without reliable banking services for years.

The Banco Central de Chile's Financial Stability Report (IEF 1-2018) included the first official analytical assessment of crypto-assets, concluding they posed limited systemic risk at that time while flagging volatility, AML exposure, and absence of legal-tender status, establishing the supervisory posture that shaped subsequent policy.

BancoEstado, Banco de Chile, Itaú, Scotiabank, and Santander closed the bank accounts of Chile's main exchanges, Buda.com, CryptoMKT, and OrionX, within days of each other citing AML/CFT risk; the incident exposed the regulatory vacuum for VASPs and became the direct catalyst for years of competition-law litigation and ultimately for the 2023 Fintech Law.