The Dutch are inclined to use digital money (“digitaal geld” in Dutch). Research shows that two-thirds of Dutch people would be willing to use the proposed digital euro. But currently there’s no government-issued digital currency in the Netherlands. And while it’s legal to hold cryptocurrency, there are few places that accept crypto payments for goods or services in the Netherlands. The reality is that most Dutch businesses don’t need a comprehensive digital currency strategy right now, but they do need a clear understanding of what digital currency (“digitale valuta” in Dutch) is so they can prepare for the future.

Below, we’ll explore what digital currency is, some considerations regarding regulation and tax, and how to assess whether it might belong in your payment setup.

Highlights

• The case for accepting crypto is strongest for B2B sellers with international counterparties or those that serve crypto-native customer segments.

• The Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation sets a harmonized EU licensing framework for crypto asset service providers (CASPs), but businesses that simply accept crypto as payment aren’t classified as CASPs and face different obligations.

• The digital euro is still in development. It’s being designed as a retail central bank digital currency (CBDC) that’s distributed through existing banks and payment providers.

What is digital currency?

Digital currency is money that exists and moves entirely in digital form, with no physical counterpart. It’s denominated, transferred, and stored digitally. It’s defined by who issues it, what backs it, how it’s governed, and how stable its value is.

The payment method iDEAL Ω| Wero isn’t a digital currency. It’s a transfer system built on top of euro bank accounts. It moves existing central bank money. Digital currencies move something structurally different.

How does digital currency work in the Netherlands?

At present, cryptocurrencies are the only actively accepted, real-world digital currency and they’re not legal tender in the Netherlands. That means no customer can compel you to accept Bitcoin and you can’t compel them to either. Any business that accepts crypto does so by choice. The Netherlands Tax Administration (Belastingdienst) treats crypto holdings as assets, reported in Box 3 of the income tax return. And they’re subject to the notional return system, where tax is based on assumed yield rather than actual gains.

The European Central Bank started the preparation phase for the digital euro in late 2023 and is accelerating progress as of spring 2026. The current design points towards a retail CBDC that’s directly available to individuals and businesses, with banks and payment processors serving as distribution intermediaries. No launch date has been confirmed.

What forms of digital currency do businesses in the Netherlands use?

There are a few use cases for Dutch businesses to work with digital currencies:

• Cryptocurrency as a payment method: Although they’re nascent, cryptocurrencies can make sense for industries such as tech and creative services. The main complications are volatility, accounting treatment, and tax reporting obligations with the Belastingdienst.

• Stablecoins for cross-border settlement: Stablecoins pegged to the US dollar or euro, such as USDC and USDT, make sense for international B2B contexts in which making or receiving international payments via traditional correspondent banking is slow or expensive.

• Digital euro (anticipated): The digital euro doesn’t exist yet as a live payment instrument, but businesses with any forward-looking payment strategy should be paying attention.

How does digital currency affect your payments infrastructure?

If you decide to accept cryptocurrency from individual customers, you can either accept it directly into a wallet you control or use a payment provider that handles conversion and settlement on your behalf.

If you accept crypto directly, you’ll have to manage private keys, exchange rate exposure, and accounting complexity. If you use a payment provider, it can accept crypto from customers on your behalf and settle in euros to your bank account. For example, Stripe supports USDC payments in eligible countries and settles in local currency so businesses don’t have to hold crypto on their books. Dutch businesses that already use Stripe for card payments can add crypto to the same infrastructure, with unified reporting.

In B2B contexts, the infrastructure question is different. You’re typically working with a crypto exchange or specialist provider and managing onchain transaction fees and reconciling blockchain transaction records against your accounting system. The tooling has improved, but it’s still more work than a standard bank transfer.

What are the considerations for digital currency in the Netherlands?

The considerations for digital currency split across various categories: regulatory, financial, and operational. None of them is insurmountable, but ignoring any of them creates problems that are much harder to fix after the fact.

Regulatory

• MiCA licensing: If your business issues tokens or provides custodial wallets, you need a license. In the Netherlands, that’s issued by the Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM). If you’re simply accepting crypto as payment, you’re not a CASP under MiCA and the licensing requirements don’t apply to you directly.

• Wwft obligations: The Anti-Money Laundering and Anti-Terrorist Financing Act is known as Wwft for short in Dutch. Under it, accepting crypto from customers doesn’t automatically make you a reporting entity. But if your volume is substantial and you’re operating anything that resembles an exchange function, get legal advice on your situation.

Financial

• Volatility: A business that invoices in euros but accepts crypto takes on exchange rate risk for however long it holds that crypto before converting. Many businesses mitigate this by converting immediately at point of sale, which is what payment providers often do by default.

• Tax treatment: The Belastingdienst requires businesses that receive crypto to convert it into euros to record as revenue. On the balance sheet date, you must value crypto holdings at cost price or market value, whichever is lower.

Operational

• Irreversibility: Blockchain transactions can’t be reversed once confirmed. If a customer pays in crypto and disputes a transaction, you handle it commercially through refunds, not through the payment network itself.

• Customer demand: Dutch customers are very well served by iDEAL | Wero, cards, and digital wallets. The incremental demand for crypto payment options is real but narrow. Unless you’re specifically targeting customers who prefer or require crypto payments, the overhead might outweigh the benefit.

Is digital currency the right fit for your business in the Netherlands?

Whether digital currency makes sense for your business comes down to your customer base and transaction type. Here’s how different types of businesses should be thinking about it:

• B2C businesses that sell to Dutch customers: You have some time before you need to consider digital currency. At present, iDEAL | Wero handles Dutch online payments efficiently, and adding crypto as a checkout option likely doesn’t make sense if it’ll be used by only a small fraction of customers. That might change if the digital euro launches and integrates smoothly with existing checkout flows, but that’s not a decision you need to make now.

• B2B businesses with international counterparties: If you’re transacting in international markets where banking infrastructure is slow or expensive, stablecoin settlement is worth seriously evaluating. The efficiency gains on cross-border payments can be meaningful, and the tooling has matured enough that it’s no longer exclusively the domain of crypto-native companies.

• Businesses with crypto-native customer segments: If you’re in tech, gaming, creative industries, or services adjacent to decentralized finance, accepting cryptocurrency through a provider like Stripe can add options without significant overhead. The conversion-to-fiat model removes much of the financial burden.

How Stripe can help

Stripe Payments provides a unified, global payment solution that helps any business—from scaling startups to global enterprises—accept payments online, in person, and around the world. Businesses can accept stablecoin payments from almost anywhere in the world that settle as fiat in their Stripe balances.

Stripe Payments can help you:

• Optimize your checkout experience: Create a frictionless customer experience and save thousands of engineering hours with prebuilt payment UIs and access to 125+ payment methods, including stablecoins and crypto.

• Expand to new markets faster: Reach customers worldwide and reduce the complexity and cost of multicurrency management with cross-border payment options, available in 195 countries across 135+ currencies.

• Unify payments in person and online: Build a unified commerce experience across online and in-person channels to personalize interactions, reward loyalty, and grow revenue.

• Improve payment performance: Increase revenue with a range of customizable, easy-to-configure payment tools, including no-code fraud protection and advanced capabilities to improve authorization rates.

• Move faster with a flexible, reliable platform for growth: Build on a platform designed to scale with you, with 99.999% historical uptime and industry-leading reliability.

Learn more about how Stripe Payments can power your online and in-person payments, or get started today.