Thomas Clausi has been fined €3.4 million and sentenced to 18 months in prison for using cryptocurrency, which Morocco considers illegal.

According to a recent report from Euronews, the Moroccan courts have upheld an 18-month prison sentence handed down to the 21-year-old French citizen for fraud and illegal use of cryptocurrency.

According to Thomas Clausi’s attorney, Mohamed Aghanaj, the ruling against him was maintained by the Casablanca Court of Appeal on Tuesday.

Clausi was detained in 2021 after using Bitcoin to purchase a high-end vehicle and according to Moroccan customs, using cryptocurrencies is against the law. 

Along with the jail time, he also had to pay a fine of over €3.4 million. The legal action was started in response to a fraud accusation made by a French woman who lives in Casablanca and sold him a Ferrari in exchange for a €400,000 Bitcoin payment.

Clausi was also the subject of another complaint, this time from a Moroccan citizen who accused him of signing a bad check in the name of a third person, obtained by the young Frenchman in exchange for Bitcoin – to buy three luxury watches. The court ordered him to compensate the owner of the watches to the tune of 40,000 dirhams (€3,900).

“He has one month and a few days left in prison”, noted Aghanaj.

Despite its illegal status in the country, Morocco was hailed as the number one in BC trading across North Africa in 2021. According to Triple-A, a Singaporean cryptocurrency provider and aggregator, about 900,000 individuals, approximately 2.4% of Morocco’s population, currently possess cryptocurrency.

More than a year later, the country has started to finalize a crypto regulatory framework that will legally define crypto within its market, according to its central bank.