FT Cryptofinance: Digital-asset groups hurry to collect crypto registrations in Europe

Story of the week: Digital-Asset groups in Europe in Europe

cryptocurrency exchanges compete to raise their flags across Europe, in the expectation of EU-wide regulation that will coordinate the block for the digital financial industry.

crypto.com and Coinbase announced this week that they secured the registration of providers of virtual assets from the supervisory authorities in Italy, while Gemini received registration in Ireland. Binance, the world's largest crypto exchange, has received registrations in France, Italy and Spain in the past few weeks.

registrations are not sufficient to receive full -fledged licenses for the company as regulated financial companies. But the rush to collect them is important because it shows how crypto companies fight to settle down in the EU before comprehensive rules, known as regulation on markets in crypto-assets (mica).

At the beginning of this month, the EU member states and the European Parliament outlined preliminary rules, which would mean that providers of cryptodes would require a national authority to offer services throughout the EU.

It is not just crypto companies that try to get an advantage before Mica is approved. The Spanish MDEP Ernest Urtasun told me that "national regulatory authorities want the stock exchanges to vote their member state". There are many evidence that support the way of thinking of Urtasun, at least when it comes to important interest groups in France and Italy, the Binance greeted enthusiastically.

"Look, we want to welcome you here. Please apply for a license," French President Emmanuel Macron told Binance, Changpeng Zhao last year. The Italian parliamentary member Davide Zanichelli meanwhile emphasized the large scope of Binance in a LinkedIn contribution after a meeting with other important Italian politicians, just a few weeks before the stock exchange was granted a registration in the country.

Many crypto groups employ hundreds or even thousands of employees, so it is easy to understand why some governments would be interested.

A big question: Will consumers understand that only because a crypto company has received registration for virtual assets, this does not mean that they are supervised by a supervisory authority like a traditional financial company?

This is a concern for Urtasun who said that he thinks that the Member States "act a little unsatisfied and give their citizens the impression that they have this activity under control".

I would like to hear from you. In your opinion, what are the most important topics and questions in digital finance? Send me an email to scott.chipolina@ft.com.

The Highlights this week

• The Dutch Central Bank has Binance with a fine of more than 3 million

• ftx, the crypto exchange from Sam Bankman-Fried, tries to change the US Futures market-far beyond crypto with potentially far-reaching effects. Here the FT has a deep insight into the plans of FTX.

• A combination of inflation and rising interest rates shaked the cryptoma markets. But many young investors are not ready to give up the risk.

• Tesla sold three quarters of its Bitcoin stocks. CEO Elon Musk caused a sensation in March last year when he said that Tesla would use Krypto as a payment method for his electric vehicles, so the conversion of a large part of his stocks to digital assets by the company into traditional currencies is important.

• The Finnish government does not stick to its Bitcoin (Hodling in the crypto jargon). The country collected 47 million euros after selling a crypto cache that it had taken up in law enforcement operations.

Soundbite of the week: "Fraud is fraud"

The US public prosecutor's office pursued a former Coinbase employee on Thursday and two employees because of a suspected insider trade.

The Securities and Exchange Commission, the top bull of Wall Street, submitted a civil lawsuit against the trio in parallel. It was the first insider trade in connection with cryptocurrency markets for both the state prosecutors in Manhattan and for the Sec - two of the most important financial enforcement authorities worldwide.

Damian Williams, US lawyer for the southern district of New York, said:

"Our message with these charges is clear: fraud is fraud, regardless of whether it is the blockchain or Wall Street. And the southern district of New York will continue to bring fraudsters to justice wherever we find it."

data mining

ether and Bitcoin have so far been very popular this year. But ether increased by about 58 percent this month, a much larger rally than that of its larger rival, which has increased around 23 percent.

ether lives on the digital main register that is known as the Ethereum, which is also the home of many other crypto projects. The profits for Ether come to a less energy-intensive "proof-of-stake" model in the expectation of a "merge", in which Ethereum is criticized from a "proof-of-work" blockchain (often criticized because of its immense energy needs and the resulting CO2 balance).

Bitcoin uses the proof-of-work model, in which miners with powerful computers solve complex puzzles to add new transactions to the blockchain for which they receive newly shaped coins.

The merger has been a topic of intensive anticipation for years, but the planned deadline in September href = "https://twitter.com/superphiz/154764325333333771?s=20&t=Woaeevl-fenty6ydcrg" Data-Trackable = "Link"> excited .

"The cryptoma markets have recovered strongly in the past few weeks, supported by the announcement of a provisional date for the fusion of Ethereum for September 19," said JPMorgan analyst Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou.