Favorable tax treatment for digital assets and balmy weather had already made Portugal a crypto hub. Now for many fleeing Russia’s invasion, it’s a place to start over.
Maria Yarotska drove for six days across Europe in a Fiat with her mother, daughter and dog to escape the war in Ukraine, ending her journey in the Portuguese capital of Lisbon. Yet unlike the thousands of refugees who made the 2,500-mile road trip to continental Europe’s westernmost country, she will still be able to keep her job.
That’s because the 35-year-old’s employer — a blockchain effort called NEAR with a Ukrainian co-founder — is expanding its presence in Portugal and has become a supporter of refugees fleeing the war.
“I have a lot of colleagues here,” Yarotska said in a telephone interview last week from Lisbon, where she was staying in temporary housing before finding a more permanent place to live. “They'll help me legalize my documents so I can stay.”
Like other western European countries that have become havens for Ukrainians fleeing Russia’s invasion, Portugal, too, is absorbing an influx of refugees. But crypto workers from Ukraine, which had established itself as an industry hub, may find it easier to start over in Portugal than in other European destinations. One reason is that Portugal is already fast becoming a hub of its own, with zero-percent taxes on digital-currency gains, affordable living costs and mild temperatures combining to attract a cadre of crypto adherents there. Another is that the country is already home to an established community of Ukrainians.
Before Russia’s invasion, Ukrainians were the fifth-largest group of foreign nationals in Portugal. In the past three weeks, the country received more than 13,000 Ukrainian refugees after the government approved measures to speed up and simplify the entry process of those fleeing the war. That's about the same as the total number of refugees that arrived in Portugal since 2015, according to data compiled by the Portuguese Immigration and Borders Service, or SEF. As a result, the number of Ukrainian nationals in Portugal has climbed to about 40,000 from about 27,200 in 2021, making it the nation’s third-largest group of ex-pats. Brazilians are No. 1, followed by the British.
In Lisbon, authorities are providing temporary housing for hundreds of refugees at a sports hall that has been turned into a reception center. City officials have also approved a plan to help find housing, jobs, schools and health care for Ukrainian refugees, according to Mayor Carlos Moedas.
Valentin Sotov, a software developer who is working on a crypto-based metaverse game called Amber, fled western Ukraine’s city of Mukachevo by car with only a backpack and a laptop at the end of February, and is already looking forward to working out of an office with the two colleagues who made the trip to Lisbon with him. It hasn’t been easy: After staying in an Airbnb and another temporary spot, they are looking for another apartment and...
Crypto Refugees Fleeing Ukraine Find a Haven in Bitcoin-Friendly Portugal - Bloomberg
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