By treating cryptos as a property/asset instead of a currency, Australia is effectively locking themselves off from becoming one of the leading crypto-tech countries. I expect startups and even big investors pulling their money out of Australia to more crypto friendly countries with less ridiculous taxation laws -- e.g. taxing only when cryptos is converted to/from fiat.
I'm sorry to say this as australians are cool people. But australia is a
shady country. Their government could be far more corrupt than its given credit for. If you want an example of this... has anyone noticed how
unbelievably slow some australians internet connections are on multiplayer games? There is a very good chance australia's government
secretly set up an internet filtering and monitoring system which kills internet connectivity. Similar to china's "great firewall".
Historically australia had good internet connectivity. Then during a time when the government began discussing internet censorship, australians suddenly saw their pings increase by a huge factor. It was blamed on an undersea telecom cable being "damaged". But given that high pings remained even after the cable was repaired the more likely explanation may be that australia's government secretly set up an oppressive internet surveillance and censorship regime.
There was also australia's controversial gun ban program, which some might say was unsuccesful. Long story short, don't be surprised if there are more nefarious policies coming out of australia. People in australia are cool but their politicians might not follow the same precedent.