Austria Considers European Regulations on Cryptocurrencies Similar to Those of Gold

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The cryptocurrency world is being deeply analysed by governments in order to impose regulations. The intention is to legitimize the market, protect consumers and pay taxes on profits. Of course, another important implication of regulations is controlling illegal activities around cryptocurrencies. Austria’s Finance Minister, Hartwig Löger has proposed crypto regulations so as to prevent virtual currencies from being used in criminal activities.

Austria Proposes Crypto Regulations in Europe

While speaking with Portugal’s Finance Minister, Mario Centeno, Löger explained that to avoid money laundering it is important to create pan-European regulations. Löger has presented its action plan for the EU Commission in Brussels. The idea is to form a working group in the next month in order to accept EU proposals about how to deal with fraud using cryptocurrencies.

Another of the ideas was to host a Fintech Regulatory Council in March where cryptocurrency experts would examine how cryptocurrency regulations would work with EU institutions. The trading rules that would apply for cryptocurrencies will be the same as for gold.

According to Bloomberg, Mr Löger Commented:

“Cryptocurrencies are significantly gaining importance in the fight against money laundering and terrorism financing. That’s an important aspect for the changes we support. We need more trust and more security.”

The investors that use cryptocurrencies will have to report bigger trades than $12,300 dollars to the financial intelligence unit. Cryptocurrency trading platforms will be supervised by the Austrian Financial Market Authority (FMA).

The FMA has also expressed its opinion about cryptocurrency regulations. The FMA has shown support for the proposition of the Finance Minister Hartwig Löger to regulate and supervise Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) will have to be approved by the FMA if they want to operate. They will have to follow close regulations to avoid market manipulation, insider trading and other fraudulent activities.

Eurozone Banks May Hold Positions in Bitcoin

As reported some time ago, Mario Draghi, President of the European Central Bank (ECB), said that financial institutions may hold positions in Bitcoin.

Mr Draghi commented:

“However, recent developments, such as the listing of Bitcoin futures contracts by US exchanges, could lead European banks too to hold positions in Bitcoin, and therefore we will certainly look at that.”

Clearly, due to the important attention that cryptocurrency gained during the last months, banks are starting to think about holding positions in cryptocurrencies. Indeed, there are banks that are working with other cryptocurrencies and not only with Bitcoin. Ripple is one of the cryptocurrencies that is being used by banks. With its different products, Ripple has been able to spread in the banking industry and other financial institutions.

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