Report contents
LATAM · Emerging
Colombia
Crypto Livability Index 2025·data to 31 Dec 2025
Scoreboard
Five pillars, then the 22 sub-pillars scored 0 to 4. Empty sub-scores are held out of the total, not zeroed.
The number behind the rank
| Raw capability score | 55 / 84 |
| P2P liquidity bonus (tie-breaker) | +3 |
| Inflation 7.8% · unbanked 43% · remittances 2.8% GDP · capital controls 0.58 · sanctions 0 | CNI 0.256 |
| Need multiplier | ×0.884 |
| Livability score | 0.579 |
Raw 55/84 = 0.655 capability. Crypto-Necessity Index 0.26, from five components: inflation 7.8% (three-year average 2023 to 2025), unbanked 43% of adults, remittances 2.8% of GDP, capital-control intensity 0.58 (KAOPEN 2023), sanctions exposure 0. Need multiplier ×0.88. Livability score 0.579, rank #15 of 79.
Three findings
The biggest jump in the region once need is priced in
Colombia ranks #38 of 79 on raw capability but climbs 23 places to #15 when the Crypto-Necessity Index (the composite of inflation, unbanked share, remittance dependence, capital controls and sanctions) is applied. The drivers are concrete: 43% of adults unbanked, inbound remittances of 2.8% of GDP on a record $11.8 billion in 2024, the third-largest corridor in the region. Stablecoin purchases made up over half of all exchange buying through mid-2025, and a need multiplier of 0.88 lifts the score.
The tax authority itself counts the crypto merchants
Colombia's DIAN, the national tax office, reports 680 businesses accepting crypto, 177 in Bogotá alone, the rare case where a government register, not a community map, anchors the merchant score at the top band. Yet utility-bill coverage is 0/6: documented rails are prepaid mobile top-ups only, and no Colombian utility provider accepts crypto.
Still in the grey area, by its own legislators' words
Colombia scores only 2 on legal status: it runs sandbox pilots through the financial regulator but has enacted no comprehensive statute, and draft bills sit in congressional committee. The framework rests on ex-post anti-money-laundering reporting rather than a licensing law.
In one line
"Colombia ranks where it does not because of its rulebook, which is still half-written, but because of its people. With four in ten adults outside a bank and a record year of remittances, the dollar stablecoin is doing the work the financial system has not."
Watch in 2026
Trajectory 3/4, trending liberalising, with three concrete steps inside the window. Bill 510 of 2025 cleared its first legislative debate, the move meant to take Colombia out of the grey area; Tax Bill 283/2025C, filed 1 September 2025, carries a chapter on the taxation of digital assets; and DIAN Resolution 000240, issued 24 December 2025, mandates platform reporting of user crypto transactions, with the first observation period running through 2026 and reporting due from 2027.