Coinbase has resumed adding users in India after more than two years, marking its first step back into a market it abruptly exited in 2023 following regulatory friction over payment pathways.
The exchange is once again allowing new registrations and crypto-to-crypto trading, with plans to reintroduce a fiat on-ramp next year, APAC head John O’Loghlen said at last week’s India Blockchain Week.
The move follows a protracted standoff sparked in 2022, when Coinbase launched in India with support for the country’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI), but pulled the feature just days after the network operator publicly refused to recognize the exchange.
Coinbase subsequently stopped services entirely, furloughed millions of Indian users and closed local access while it reassessed regulatory exposure.
O’Loghlen said the company opted for a “clean slate” approach and began collaborating directly with the Financial Intelligence Unit, the agency responsible for monitoring digital asset transactions. Coinbase completed FIU registration earlier this year and began supporting users through an early access program in October.
The app is now widely open, although trading remains limited to cryptocurrency pairs until fiat rails return.
India remains one of the toughest major markets for stock exchanges due to a flat 30% tax on crypto profits, a loss offset ban, and a 1% transaction tax that suppresses trading volumes.
Despite regulatory uncertainty, Coinbase continues to invest in the country. Its venture arm recently raised its stake in local exchange CoinDCX to a valuation of $2.45 billion, and the company plans to expand its workforce of more than 500 people in India across both domestic and global product lines.
