Digital Assets (Scotland) Bill: Fairer Scotland Duty - assessment not required declaration

Digital Assets (Scotland) Bill

Fairer Scotland Duty Assessment screening draft examining potential impacts of the Digital Assets (Scotland) Bill which declares that a full assessment is not required.

Directorate: International Trade and Investment

Division: Investment and Financial Services

Team: Financial Services

Policy lead responsible for taking the decision: Kieran Burke, Bill Team Leader

Rationale for decision

The primary purpose of the Digital Assets (Scotland) Bill is to provide legal certainty by confirming that digital assets can be objects of property under Scots private law.

There has been a lack of litigation in the Scottish courts to determine the legal status of digital assets, meaning Scots private law is unable to rely on a body of case law to provide the legal answers required about digital assets. Stakeholder engagement, notably with representatives from the legal sector, suggested this situation was unlikely to change in the near future. In these circumstances, it is appropriate for legal uncertainty to be remedied by primary legislation.

An absence of legal certainty in Scotland may be perceived as a relative disadvantage to businesses and individuals when evaluating different jurisdictions for the purposes of investment activities. Providing legal certainty will also help to support areas of emerging importance to Scotland’s economy, such as its growing FinTech sector.

The Bill will make provision to clarify that certain kinds of digital asset can be objects of property in Scots private law, with reference to defining statutory characteristics. The Bill will confirm the legal classification of these digital assets and detail how ownership is established and the rules governing the voluntary transfer of ownership. The Bill will confirm the applicability of the general principles of Scots private law to digital assets.

The Bill is not intended to codify all of the legal principles or rules applying to digital assets. The Bill will purposively have a narrow scope of application. The scope of the reservations of fiscal, economic and monetary policy and of insolvency under the Scotland Act 1998 are such that the Scottish Government would not seek to make provision concerning either insolvency or taxation, to avoid encroaching upon these reservations. Likewise, the Scottish Government would not seek to make provision concerning consumer protection, which is also a reserved matter.

The Bill will be a short, focussed and technical piece of legislation, that will have a narrow scope of application. An assessment under the Fairer Scotland Duty is not required because the Bill does not represent a strategic decision, and it is not expected to have any direct implications for inequalities arising from socio-economic disadvantage.

I confirm that the decision not to carry out a Fairer Scotland assessment has been authorised by:

Andy Hogg, Deputy Director, DITI

Date authorisation given: 7 August 2025