The Madras High Court’s October 2025 ruling marked a landmark decision recognizing cryptocurrency as property under Indian law. This means crypto assets are intangible movable property that investors can legally own and hold in trust, rather than just speculative or contractual entries on a platform. The judgment arose from a WazirX user’s petition after her XRP tokens were threatened with reallocation following a July 2024 hack.
The court rejected the logic behind the exchange’s rebalancing plan that spread hack losses across all users, emphasizing that platforms owe fiduciary duties to investors, which prevent arbitrary freezing or redistributing of unaffected holdings. This ruling gives Indian crypto investors stronger legal protection, allowing them to use remedies like injunctions, trust claims, and misappropriation suits, rather than passive acceptance of exchange-driven recovery models.
Globally, the legal battles resulting from exchange hacks follow a similar trend as seen from 2016, Bitfinex hack and KuCoin’s 2020 hack of around $280 million. Conversely, exchanges like Italy’s BitGrail collapsed amid legal limbo and delayed recoveries, leaving users stranded as unsecured creditors. Such cases underscore the importance of courts recognizing crypto as property held in trust, which accelerates investor remedies and accountability for custodians worldwide.
Today, WazirX investors legally stand on stronger ground, able to argue their digital assets on the exchange are identifiable property held in trust. Although WazirX has completed its rebalancing and is awaiting a creditor vote that could grant roughly 85% compensation, investors can still challenge using the Madras judgment as a precedent. Exchanges can no longer treat user balances as a discretionary pool. Crypto investors are transforming from mere platform users into rights-bearing owners, armed with both blockchain evidence and legal muscle.
CRYPTO IS PROPERTY, AND ITS OWNERS ARE FIGHTING BACK.