The government of Uruguay in South America has introduced a new bill that would see all cryptocurrency-related activity being regulated within the nation’s borders.
Uruguay Wants to Regulate Crypto
Under the new bill, central banks would serve as the ultimate regulatory authority. The status of cryptocurrencies and digital assets would be fully outlined in the bill, and all companies that delve in digital tokens or in blockchain would fall under the supervision of what’s known as the Superintendency of Financial Services (SSF), which is the leading central bank entity in all of Uruguay.
In addition, they will also be required to remain fully compliant with anti-money laundering laws and KYC (know your customer) protocols to prevent customers from being scammed. The bill states:
If the activity carried out with these instruments involves the exercise of financial intermediation or financial activity, it will be subject to the regulation and control of the Central Bank of Uruguay.
The news is positive in that crypto legislation is being pushed forward, which means the entire space within that neck of the woods is set to become far more legitimate and mainstream. People will likely have questions and ideas about crypto that the central banks can address, and as more people begin to learn about crypto, the more it will be used.
At the same time, regulation is something of a two-sided coin (pardon the pun) in that the crypto space was initially designed to be free of such elements. It was designed to have no tolerance of third parties, and all who entertained the idea of trading or holding crypto would be given full financial freedom. Regulation ultimately does away with that in the sense that people who engage in crypto activity will now be subject to the same centralized nature that is often witnessed in banks and other traditional financial institutions.
As a result, they no longer have the independence that the crypto space at one point flaunted so prominently for all to see and be enthused by. Regulation, in many ways, goes against everything that the crypto space is all about. It’s a rough situation because without it, the space is still vulnerable to fraud and other illicit activity. With regulation in place, users don’t have the freedoms they might have had eight to ten years ago.
Paraguay Already Said “No”
Much has occurred in the field of crypto regulation over the past year on the continent of South America, where Uruguay is located. Recently, the president of Paraguay – another South American region – vetoed a bill that would have called for full regulation of the mining sector.
The bill would have set crypto mining up as an industrial activity, though the President denied that this could ever occur given how much energy the mining space allegedly uses each year.
Source: https://www.livebitcoinnews.com/uruguay-is-calling-for-crypto-regulation/