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Sunday, Aug 14, 2022

EU agrees on landmark rules to tame 'Wild West' crypto market


The rules aim to better protect consumers from wild swings in cryptocurrencies and require more transparency on the industry’s environmental impact.

The European Union has agreed on landmark rules for regulating the cryptocurrency industry, whose meltdown has been wiping out fortunes and sparking calls for tighter scrutiny worldwide.

EU negotiators hammered out the final details for a provisional agreement late on Thursday on a sweeping package of crypto regulations for the bloc’s 27 nations, known as Markets in Crypto Assets, or MiCA.

"Today, we put order in the Wild West of crypto assets and set clear rules for a harmonised market,” said Stefan Berger, the lead lawmaker negotiating the rules.

The EU's crypto rules "will ensure a harmonised market, provide legal certainty for crypto-asset issuers, guarantee a level playing field for service providers and ensure high standards for consumer protection," he said in a statement.

The new law gives issuers of crypto assets and providers of related services a “passport” to serve clients across the EU from a single base, while meeting capital and consumer protection rules.


The EU rules are "really the first comprehensive piece of crypto regulation in the world," said Patrick Hansen, crypto venture adviser at Presight Capital, a venture capital fund.

"I think there will be a lot of jurisdictions that will look closely into how the EU has dealt with it since the EU is first here," Hansen said.

He expected authorities in other places, especially smaller countries that don’t have the resources to draw up their own rules from scratch, to adopt ones similar to the EU’s, though "they might change a few details".

Protecting novice crypto investors


Companies issuing or trading crypto assets such as stablecoins - which are usually tied to the dollar or a commodity like gold that make them less volatile than normal cryptocurrencies - face tough transparency requirements requiring them to provide detailed information on the risks, costs and charges that consumers face.



Providers of Bitcoin-related services would fall under the regulations, but not Bitcoin itself, the world's most popular cryptocurrency that has lost more than 70 per cent of its value from its November peak.

Addressing crypto's carbon footprint

To address concerns about the carbon footprint left by Bitcoin mining, which guzzles massive amounts of electricity for “proof of work” computer processing to record and secure transactions, crypto companies will have to disclose their energy use and prominently display information online about their environmental and climate impact.


The EU said that unlike cryptocurrencies, the digital assets, which can represent artwork, sports memorabilia or anything else that can be digitised, are unique and sold at a fixed price. But it left room to reclassify them later as a crypto asset under MiCA or as a financial instrument.

The European rules are aimed at maintaining financial stability - a growing concern for regulators amid a string of recent crypto-related crashes. For example, the stablecoin TerraUSD imploded last month, erasing an estimated $40 billion (€38.2 billion) in investor funds with little or no accountability.

The meltdowns have spurred calls for regulation, with other major jurisdictions still drawing up their strategies. In the US, President Joe Biden issued an executive order in March on government oversight of cryptocurrency, including studying the impact on financial stability and national security.


The UK also has unveiled plans to regulate some cryptocurrencies.



The EU also provisionally agreed on Wednesday on new rules subjecting cryptocurrency transfers to the same money-laundering rules as traditional banking transfers.




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