Crypto trading booms in India's interiors as job growth and incomes disappoint

Nagpur: Like thousands of his countrymen in far-flung places, flower-shop owner Ashish Nagose has been learning about trading cryptocurrencies by attending classes every weekday for the past two months in his home city of Nagpur in western India.

Nagose has bought and sold stock options earlier but is now venturing into cryptocurrencies as regulators have made it harder to trade equity derivatives in India. The 28-year-old believes the red-hot crypto asset class can help shield his family-owned flower shop during downturns.

"I want to run my family shop, and hope that trading can
provide a steady income when business slows down, like in the
month after (the Hindu festival of) Diwali," he said, seated at
the storefront surrounded by bunches of red roses and orange
marigolds.

Newfound crypto enthusiasts in India such as Nagose have
helped grow cumulative trading volumes of bitcoin, ethereum,
dogecoin and other cryptocurrencies on four of its largest
exchanges more than two-fold quarter-on-quarter to $1.9 billion
in the October-December quarter, according to data from
aggregator CoinGecko.

Many young Indians are dabbling in crypto trading to
supplement their regular income in the world's most populous
country where jobs and pay increases have lagged world-beating
economic growth. Nearly two-thirds of its 1.4 billion people are
below the age of 35, according to a government report.

From stocks and derivatives, they are now gravitating
towards crypto assets whose prices have soared after U.S.
President Donald Trump's election victory in November promised a
looser regulatory regime for the asset.

"There is a lot of curiosity at the ground level ...
especially with Trump becoming the U.S. president and the entire
flavour of crypto changing world over," said Edul Patel,
co-founder of Mudrex, an Indian crypto exchange.

Overall, India's crypto market is expected to grow to more
than $15 billion in 2035 from $2.5 billion last year at a
compound annual growth rate of 18.5%, said Kush Wadhwa, partner
at consulting firm Grant Thornton Bharat.

Retail traders have driven the bulk of the interest in the
asset, according to exchange executives, even as ETFs and
institutions have pushed up crypto prices globally.

Out of the top 10 centres that propelled crypto activity in
India in 2024, seven were lower-tiered cities, such as Jaipur,
Lucknow and Pune, according to CoinSwitch, one of India's
largest crypto platforms.

"Growth is now being driven by non-metro cities. That's true
for the stock world and it's true for crypto," said Balaji
Srihari, vice president at CoinSwitch which has 20 million
users.

The surging interest may challenge Indian authorities who
have discouraged trading in cryptocurrencies by levying steep
taxes and have warned against their risks and volatility.

But that has not stopped 25-year-old Sagar Neware, a
Nagpur-based mechanical engineer, from spending his nights
trading them.

"My father had to shut down his plastic packaging business a
few years back so my first dream is to restart it with the money
I can earn from trading," said Neware, who earns 25,000 rupees
($288) a month from working at the local transport office.

To hone their crypto trading skills, Neware and about two
dozen others gather at the Thoughts Magic Trading Academy in
Nagpur each weekday.

Yash Jaiswal, an equity options trader who runs the classes
in a shop room, says he has tutored about 1,500 people over the
last two years.

"You're just one trade away from your dream life," says a
poster on the wall of the classroom.

MACROECONOMIC RISK

Who has regulatory oversight of cryptocurrencies in India is
unclear.

While the 30% tax it levies on crypto trading gains is among
the most stringent globally, the country, unlike most G-20
nations, has neither introduced new norms to govern crypto, nor
folded it under existing securities rules. It has also not
imposed an outright ban on it.

Reuters reported last year that India's market regulator has
signaled it is open to oversight of crypto trade, but the
government is still to take a view.

The central bank, though, has continued to warn against it.

"Widespread usage of crypto assets and stablecoins has
consequences for macroeconomic and financial stability," it said
in its Financial Stability Report in December 2024.

India's federal finance ministry, the central bank and the
market regulator did not respond to emails seeking comment.