A global pattern is emerging: extreme right-wing organisations and state actors are using cryptocurrencies to make clandestine donations to likeminded political movements.
A big development came from the UK in May 2025, when Nigel Farage announced at a conference in Las Vegas that Reform would be the
first party in Europe to accept cryptocurrencies as donations. Farage held up a draft of a
Crypto Assets and Digital Finance Bill, which he said he would pass if he was elected prime minister, the BBC reported.
"Let's recognise that crypto, Bitcoin, and digital assets are here to stay", Farage said, before promising the audience that his party would trigger a "crypto revolution” across the country.
The UK has clear rules on political donations, including who can donate, what counts as a donation, how donations should be reported, as well as what the limits are. Due to the decentralised nature of cryptocurrencies, much of the requisite transparency
for political donations is compromised – which is causing concern among MPs and sparking calls for reform.
Farage’s partiality for crypto is surpassed in the West only by President Trump, who since returning to office in January 2025 has presided over a raft of digital currency
deals, launched his own
meme coin, and even erected a
golden statue of himself in front of the US Capitol, clutching a physical Bitcoin.
Vladimir Putin is not blind to the geopolitical applications of cryptocurrency either. Indeed, the Russian Federation has long recognised crypto’s potential to further its foreign policy aims in eastern Europe. Back in October 2024, members of the European
Parliament issued a
strong warning against continued Russian attempts to derail Moldova's pro-European trajectory. Recently, these attempts have involved a Russian-funded
fake news network aimed at disrupting Moldova’s 28 September parliamentary ballot, and the deployment of
$100m of crypto by Russia, according to Moldova’s president.
On 13 September 2025, during Tommy Robinson’s Unite the Kingdom rally in Whitehall, crypto’s footprint on UK politics was plain to see. On large screens, through which Elon Musk addressed protesters by video link, were displayed the logos of the
rally’s sponsors –
all but one were crypto firms.
One of the event’s key sponsors was Athena Bitcoin Global, which provides various crypto asset transaction platforms in the US, El Salvador, Argentina, Colombia, and Mexico. In early September 2025, Athena was
accused by the attorney general for the District of Columbia (DC) of knowingly profiting from cybercrimes targeting elderly victims for “life-altering” sums of cash.
Athena’s chief executive, Matias Goldenhörn, said to
The Observer: “Athena believes the UK must break free from anti-free speech tyranny if it is to endure as a western nation. We were proud to sponsor the rally.” He added that “Bitcoin is the free speech of money.”
Another of Unite the Kingdom’s sponsors was Fomo, a social-first crypto trading app, which also supported a smaller Robinson march in June 2024 – leveraging the event to promote its fledgling Fomo coin. Fomo’s owner, Ashley Ward, later
claimed he has access to the “biggest names in the political space.”
This ability of cryptocurrencies to slip under the radar – and fund extremist political movements in ways that would breach traditional political donation rules – does not come as a shock to officials. UK authorities have in the past aired concerns around
the potential for non-government-controlled currencies to challenge our civil stability and democracy. Some senior MPs are even fighting to delay the next
elections bill, so that a clause banning crypto-powered political donations can be incorporated. Ahead of this curve are Ireland, Brazil and Greenland (itself once in the
crosshairs of Trump), which have already enacted laws banning crypto donations. A portion of the annual Labour
conference, taking place in Liverpool from 28 September to 1 October 2025, is dedicated to identifying a similar response.
One of the headline promises Keir Starmer campaigned on – to “mainline” artificial intelligence (AI) into the UK economy –
may have the side effect of exacerbating the political donations issue. Indeed, when paired with crypto, AI has the ability to automatically break down large, illicit political donations into thousands of smaller values – as low as £500 – thereby ducking UK
reporting thresholds.
Director of the Royal United Services Institute’s Centre for Finance and Security, Tom Keatinge,
said to The Observer: “The average person in the UK might think of [crypto] as being a marginal thing, but in that [far-right] community – which is a growing community – it’s mainstream.”
Sadly, crypto’s increasing affiliation with extremist interests may be derailing the technology’s wider prospects of becoming a legitimate vehicle for economic growth – a key aim of the Labour government.
Stablecoins, in particular, are suffering from regulatory apprehension, despite their ability to be pegged to a stable asset, such as a fiat currency, like the Great British Pound (GBP). Indeed, stablecoins have been shown to enable faster and cheaper cross-border
payments, increase financial access, and even facilitate programmable money features for decentralised finance applications. As such, they offer the efficiency of blockchain transactions while avoiding the volatility of cryptocurrencies. These are among the
reasons the number of stablecoins globally has risen from one to 176 since 2014 – and are worth a combined
$280bn.
Fears are growing that if The Bank of England (BoE) enacts its
proposals to impose strict caps on the value of stablecoins that individuals and companies can hold, it will freeze Britain out of the stablecoin race. This runs against the UK’s aim of becoming a
hub of global crypto innovation.
In a September 2025
report by Imperial College London – titled Mind the Gap: How Stablecoins can Secure the UK’s Financial Future – it is argued that unless the government moves quickly to construct a permissive regulatory regime for stablecoins, it could squander
a great economic opportunity. The authors of the report even go as far as claiming that the BoE is underplaying its hand – and should mirror the US in allowing sterling stablecoins to be backed by “almost risk-free” assets, like short-term government debt.
Recent civil unrest in the UK – and around the world – has shone a light on the influence that cryptocurrencies can have on our politics. But these risks should not blacken the entire digital currency brand. Stablecoin issuances could become a legitimate
engine for economic growth and even push out bad actors in the process. By issuing a well-designed digital pound, the BoE has the power to constrain privatised money creation – as well as the rise of extremism that tails it.