The Philippine’s market regulator, Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) declared on September 3rd that it is all set to release new draft rules on cryptocurrency exchanges, as the government aims to create a healthy business environment for digital currency exchanges.
SEC Commissioner Ephyro Luis B. Amatong stated that regulators have scheduled the release of draft regulations for virtual currency exchanges within next week.
“Virtual currency exchanges (VCEs) have licenses similar to that of money changers. They can exchange from cryptocurrency to fiat currency. But many of the VCEs, all of the VCEs are applying to allow them to act as trading platforms. When the trading platforms come in, this is a concern of SEC that we will discuss with BSP,” he said.
Earlier last month, the SEC regulators released proposed rules for initial ICO operators in the nation. The proposed regulations also include reportorial needs, advertising for the offering and compensations for the return of investment funding if the ICO is not accomplished. The regulators are all set to release the final version of its ICO by the end of next week after considering the public feedback.
The SEC is planning to enter into the “cooperative oversight” by collaborating with BSP (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas), the central bank of Philippines.
Amatong further stated: “We already discussed the matter with the BSP since the BSP is also interested and we are also interested. The discussion involves joint cooperative oversight over (virtual currency exchanges) engaged in trading.”
The BSP stated that VCE’s are mandatory to have safeguards and security measures to report the threats related to digital currency transactions, like basic controls on consumer protection, anti-money laundering, technology risk management and terrorist financing.
“Previously you had to go through all of the infrastructures of the PSE (Philippine Stock Exchange) or a PDEx (Philippine Dealing & Exchange Corp.), a traditional stock to raise funds but what the fintech promises are you can achieve that through technology at a lower cost,” Amatong said.
He further discussed that the proposed regulations released by the SEC will permit the small and medium companies to raise capital for future growth.
According to a business insider report, one of the local banks called Union Bank also revealed its curiosity in Bitcoin by conducting many experiments that include mining to know how it functions. In addition to the Philippines, Thailand is all set to finalise its cryptocurrency and ICO regulations.
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