Cryptocurrency advocates are pressing Congress for final passage of a bill aimed at increasing oversight over the sector after the FTX collapse raised new concerns about the sector.
FTX filed for bankruptcy last week and is being investigated by U.S. authorities amid reports that $10 billion in client assets were transferred from the cryptocurrency exchange to trading company Alameda Research, owned by FTX founder , Sam Bankman-Fried.
Roberto Dagnoni, chief executive of the holding company that controls Bitcoin Market, said that the law was “kind of dormant” during the election period, but now it needs to be a priority.
“If there is a silver lining (in the FTX debacle), it is that the law will be prioritized,” he told Reuters on Tuesday. “The rules that currently exist have not been applied to some groups, so they can do whatever they want… That (law) would change the picture a lot.”
The bill, approved earlier this year by the Senate and now awaiting approval by the Chamber of Deputies, wants to oblige all cryptocurrency service providers active in the country to have a physical entity in Brazil and to notify suspected cases of money laundering. and other criminal activities. The text provides for fines and even imprisonment in case of non-compliance.
Brazil is one of the 10 largest cryptocurrency markets in the world, according to data from Chainalysis.
Fernando Furlan, former president of the Brazilian Association of Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain (ABCB), also said he hoped that the FTX saga would be “the missing push” for the law to be passed.
Furlan added that while the law may make it harder for so-called “dot com” cryptocurrency exchanges and smaller groups to operate due to higher regulatory standards, the benefits of the text outweigh.
“If it’s good for Brazilian investors, then it’s a good law,” he added.
The newspaper Folha de S. Paulo last week quoted the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira, as saying that the plenary was ready to vote on the law before the end of the year.
The president of the Securities and Exchange Commission (CVM), João Pedro Nascimento, said at an industry event that “it is important that we start having rules” for cryptocurrencies and that the bill “is very close”.
However, some key players are skeptical that the proposal will be approved so quickly, given the 2023 budget issues, which gained priority after Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s victory in the presidential elections.
Lira did not comment on the matter. FTX does not have a large presence in Latin America.
Dagnoni told Reuters that Mercado Bitcoin, active mainly in Brazil and Portugal, has no exposure to FTX and that it has developed its own custody solution to store client assets.
The executive added that the platform even saw net positive flows despite massive withdrawals of resources from the sector globally.
“I think people are separating the asset from the mismanagement,” he said.
Source: CNN Brasil
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