Crypto license in Poland: MiCA CASP requirements (2026)

Poland's lower house fast-tracked and passed a revised Crypto-Assets Market Act by 241 votes to 200, designating KNF as the national competent authority and aligning with MiCA's CASP licensing regime. The bill heads to the Senate and then to a president who has twice vetoed near-identical legislation, with the EU's July 1, 2026 MiCA transitional deadline looming.

President Karol Nawrocki vetoed a second, nearly identical version of the Crypto-Assets Market Act, citing unchanged objections about KNF's power to impose fines up to PLN 10 million, order domain shutdowns, and expose executives to criminal liability. Poland became the sole EU member state without MiCA-transposing national legislation, forcing domestic crypto firms to consider relocating.

After falling 18 votes short of the three-fifths supermajority needed to override the December 1 presidential veto, Poland's Sejm re-passed the Crypto-Asset Market Act unchanged and sent it to the Senate; the bill was then slightly revised and resubmitted to the President, setting up a second veto in February 2026.

President Nawrocki vetoed Poland's first comprehensive crypto-market law, describing it as a 'real threat to freedoms and state stability,' and objecting to provisions granting KNF powers to block domains and levy heavy fines on smaller firms, an approach he argued went beyond what most EU states adopted. The veto triggered a political stalemate that left Poland unprepared for MiCA's full application days later.

The Polish Financial Supervision Authority placed Foris DAX MT, the Malta-incorporated entity behind Crypto.com, on its official public warning list for alleged unauthorized provision of financial services in Poland, referring the matter to the Warsaw regional prosecutor. The action, taken under Art. 178 of the Financial Instruments Trading Act, demonstrated KNF's willingness to use existing enforcement tools against major platforms even without a crypto-specific licensing regime.

Entities that had been operating virtual currency services before October 31, 2021 were required by law to complete registration in the Virtual Currency Activities Register (maintained by the Director of the Tax Administration Chamber in Katowice) by April 30, 2022. Non-registration exposed operators to criminal penalties, closing the regulatory gap for legacy market participants.

The Act of 23 October 2018 amending the Personal Income Tax Act took effect, classifying proceeds from disposal of virtual currency as 'income from monetary capital' subject to a flat 19% rate, declared annually via the new PIT-38 form. Critically, exchanging one cryptocurrency for another was legislated as tax-neutral; only conversion to fiat currency or goods/services triggers a taxable event, resolving years of conflicting tax authority guidance.