Led by Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the UK government has announced an immediate moratorium on cryptocurrency donations to political parties, citing concerns that digital assets could be used to obscure the origins of foreign money in British politics, according to the Press Association.
The move puts cryptocurrencies at the center of a broader crackdown on foreign interference, signaling that regulators are increasingly treating anonymous digital payments as a democratic risk rather than just a financial one.
The ban, triggered by the government-commissioned review of Rycroft, covers donations of any size and comes into force today. Parties have 30 days from now to return any crypto received once the legislation is passed, after which criminal penalties apply. Donations from British expats abroad will also be capped at £100,000 a year.
The author of the review, former senior civil servant Philip Rycroft, stopped short of calling for a permanent ban, framing the moratorium as a pause for regulation to catch up with reality. But with the rules written in the Representation of the People Bill currently going through Parliament, the bar for raising them is high.
“I was not here to look out for the interests of any political party,” Rycroft said. “I was here to safeguard the interests of our democratic processes.”
Members of Reform UK, which is currently leading in the polls, walked out of Parliament during the announcement. Prime Minister Keir Starmer slammed reform leader Nigel Farage, suggesting he would “say anything, no matter how divisive, if he was paid to do it”.
