When will Europe’s Bitcoin rules be made official?
In the last week, there were many reports and news about the UK and its intentions to introduce new regulations impacting cryptocurrencies. Some people claimed that these news were responsible for the volatility of the cryptocurrency. Bitcoin previously had a drop from around $12.000 to approximately $11.000.
The UK's government has been talking about its intentions to extend the country's anti-money laundering laws. Moreover, the government wants new rules to also cover cryptocurrency exchanges. This move will definitely worry some people. But, the UK's government declared that if such rules will apply to cryptocurrencies, they will also represent a “stamp of approval” for them.
The European Union's amendment affecting cryptocurrencies is still pending
However, we must say that the real big change came from the European Union, which previously added the amendment on “the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing.” As we know, the European Commission proposed this rule last year in July. But, since then the amendment has been pending into the legislative process.
The CEO of CommerceBlock, Nicholas Gregory, stated in an interview for the Business Insider that:
“What some will bill as censure, the cryptocurrency community will deem as a stamp of approval that finally recognises the pivotal role that digital currencies will ultimately hold for the global economy. Industry players want the same thing as politicians — cryptocurrencies that offer cheap, frictionless, international transactions used for legal purposes. If anything, regulation will only increase bitcoin’s rate of growth as regulation lends credibility and engenders trust.”
To be added that the European Parliament also declared that all Member States have the mission to ensure that all businesses from the cryptocurrency domain are “licensed or registered.”
The European Central Bank suggested the Parliament to redefine the digital currencies term, because it needs improvements. So, there will be launched a new definition of a “custodian wallet provider,” which would mean “an entity that provides services to safeguard private cryptographic keys on behalf of their customers, to holding, store and transfer virtual currencies”.
