ETERBASE, a digital asset exchange based in Liechtenstein, has been given the green light to operate by the country’s Financial Market Authority (FMA) regulatory body.
The FMA operates under public law and covers all the country’s financial markets.
Following a legal opinion submitted to the regulatory body by NÄGELE Attorneys at Law LLC, which specializes in public and private law in capital markets, the FMA has stated that it does not intend to regulate ETERBASE’s crypto-to-crypto business at this time.
Robert Auxt, ETERBASE’s co-founder, shared the company’s excitement about the positive move.
“We are extremely excited about getting over our first major regulatory hurdle to be recognized as a cryptocurrency exchange in Europe,” said Auxt.
ETERBASE prides itself on being fully compliant with existing financial regulations and aims to continue its regulatory stature to nurture and maintain a safe and reliable cryptocurrency exchange.
“We at ETERBASE will continue to push ourselves to become the most regulatory compliant exchange in Europe and will work towards providing our customers with the safest, most trustworthy trading experience available,” Auxt added.
Liechtenstein’s FMA says that, as ETERBASE will only be matching orders rather than directly exchanging crypto-to-fiat trading pairs on its own account, regulating the exchange base is not applicable.
“For this purpose, ETERBASE is also teaming up with regulated financial institutions and crypto-custodians to provide fiat gateways, cold storage, and hot wallet services,” the FMA commented. “In this way, the business model will allow customers to choose from a variety of financial institutions and custodians to serve their needs and security requirements.”
Government regulation of crypto markets
The FMA’s opinion is a testament to Liechtenstein’s ground-breaking and exemplary role of government regulation of digital currency financial markets.
In March this year, the Liechtenstein government took the bold step of announcing a comprehensive Blockchain Act, designed to integrate current business models in regulatory terms to give firms and their clients legal certainty.
Under the proposed Blockchain Act, Liechtenstein will become, as a report by PwC confirms, “one of the first countries in the world to regulate the blockchain topic to this extent and thus create the basis of extensive economic applications.”
The UK proposes cryptocurrency exchange regulation
The UK looks set to follow in Liechtenstein’s footsteps, with the Bank of England’s Mark Carney announcing cryptocurrency exchanges are to face a regulatory clampdown.
“The time has come to hold the crypto-asset ecosystem to the same standards as the rest of the financial system,” the Bank of England Governor said when he addressed the Scottish Economic Conference in March this year.
By obtaining a positive FMA opinion, it looks like ETERBASE, Europe’s first regulation-compliant cryptocurrency exchange, will act as an exemplary marker for bringing tighter regulatory control to cryptocurrency trading in Europe.