Importance of regulation

Appropriate regulation is extremely important. We are continuously reminded of this every time crypto exchanges and/or custodians experience technical difficulties or security breaches resulting in the loss of customers assets.

Regulators globally will understand the significance of true regulation to protect against risks to crypto consumers but over regulation does not help either. In order to achieve the right balance, regulators need to have a technical understanding of how distributed ledger technology works so that they can see where the potential risks and pitfalls lie but also so that they know what are the measures that can be put in place to mitigate such risks.

Some jurisdictions are taking a light touch approach, where as others are focusing solely on KYC and AML. In my view, it is Gibraltar's Financial Services Commission that is leading the way in so far as the regulation of crypto assets is concerned and word is starting to get round.