Keyword: EU law

European Crypto Regulation on the Verge of Enactment

The EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulations are now all but final and may take effect this year. MiCA will provide new regulatory frameworks, including licensing and disclosure obligations, for participants in the cryptocurrency ecosystem, including token issuers, financial intermediaries (exchanges, brokers, etc.) and custodians.

What Happened

The Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee of the European Parliament gave its approval to MiCA on October 10, 2022, the latest step in a process that has lasted more than two years.

What’s Next

This paves the way for the larger European Parliament plenary to approve the regulations, a step that often is merely procedural. Once the plenary approves MiCA, it will become effective and mark the beginning of 18 months in which firms must become compliant, with the regulations coming into full effect in the second or third quarter of 2024.

While the text of MiCA helps provide regulatory certainty for crypto-asset businesses and consumers in the EU, additional practical guidelines for implementation will also be drafted to further elaborate MiCA.

MiCA’s Goals

MiCA’s main objective is to provide a level of regulatory and economic harmonization to crypto-asset businesses and consumers across Europe. Guiding principles of MiCA include:

  • Providing legal certainty through clear definitions of crypto assets and activities in relation to those crypto assets that are in scope;
  • Providing for consumer protection and market integrity alongside financial stability of crypto-asset businesses; and
  • Encouraging innovation and fair competition in the European crypto-assets markets and avoiding regulatory arbitrage between member states.

Businesses engaged in activities that are within the scope of MiCA will, at a minimum, be required to register with the competent regulatory authorities and produce a detailed white paper for their business, in a form and content specified by MiCA.

MiCA will not apply in the United Kingdom or Switzerland as they are not member states of the European Union. While similar principles of regulation may apply in these two jurisdictions, separate analysis is needed to understand what crypto-asset businesses must do to achieve compliance with local regulation.

What MiCA Missed

The final text of MiCA omits treatment of Non-Fungible Tokens, Decentralised Finance, Decentralized Autonomous Organizations and Proof of Work consensus mechanisms. European regulators are expected, however, to treat fractionalized NFTs as utility tokens governed by MiCA.

How Will MiCA Impact the U.S. Market?

MiCA reflects the EU’s acknowledgement that digital assets are a persistent part of a modern financial system. Whether the EU’s steps to define and regulate digital assets will influence U.S. regulators remains to be seen.

The Biden Administration’s March 2022 Executive Order on Ensuring Responsible Development of Digital Assets remains the most comprehensive U.S. policy statement on the topic. While there are numerous proposed legislative efforts in the U.S. Congress, the U.S. has yet to produce comprehensive legislation or regulatory guidance. Instead, regulators have relied on enforcement actions and individual agency guidance to inform market participants. We expect the U.S. regulatory regime to continue, at least in the short term, to take coordinated but separate action aligned with the Executive Order’s primary objectives of protecting consumers and investors.

The Orrick fintech team takes an international approach to digital asset markets. We will continue to monitor regulatory developments in both the U.S. and Europe to support our clients and innovation in crypto.

Recent Reports Show UK and EU (Slowly) Progressing Towards Virtual Currency Regulation

Currently there is no EU-harmonized approach for the specific regulation of virtual currency. In September 2018, the UK’s Treasury Committee released a report on crypto-assets as a part of its ongoing Digital Currencies Inquiry, in which the Committee strongly and unanimously recommended that the UK regulate virtual currencies and initial coin offerings (“ICOs”) as a matter of priority. It will be important for the UK not to be too restrictive as this could drive innovative business away from the UK. The EU Parliament’s All-party Innovation Group has drafted a proposal examining potential new rules that would bring ICOs within the scope of the EU-wide harmonizing crowdfunding regulation that is currently being drafted. While it is certain that any regulation needs to be carefully considered, the lack of a harmonized approach to regulation of ICOs will lead, as is happening currently, to a piecemeal approach across member states that will hamper blockchain developments.

Learn more from this recent Orrick-authored alert.

Virtual Currencies Fall Within Scope of EU’s Fifth Anti-Money Laundering Directive

The fifth iteration of the Anti-Money Laundering Directive (MLD5) took effect in July 2018. In addition to several updates covering a wide range of anti-money laundering objectives, MLD5 extends its coverage to include certain cryptocurrency service providers.

Learn more about the updates under MLD5, including further details regarding the inclusion of cryptocurrencies within the scope of EU anti-money laundering and terrorist financing regulations, in this recent alert.