France’s Crypto Regulations Revised

To align national regulations with the pan-European framework established by Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA), France’s extant crypto regime will undergo revisions in 2019.

Due to the “enhanced” registration, the Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF), France’s primary financial authority, announced the provisions of its General Regulation and its policy on digital asset service providers (DASPs).

The news release was distributed on August 10. A new Article 721-1-2 of the AMF General Regulation outlines the “enhanced” registration requirements for crypto platforms.

These requirements include systems for managing conflicts of interest, more disclosure requirements, separating client assets from platform assets, and making it illegal to use client assets without their prior express consent.

The amendments will become mandatory on January 1, 2024, and applicants for enhanced DASP registration must take them into account.

However, DASPs that obtain registration before January 1, 2024, benefit from a “grandfather clause” and are subject to the previous, more straightforward iteration of the framework.

MiCA, the first comprehensive crypto framework, was authorized by the European Parliament in April 2023 and is expected to go into effect in three phases between 2024 and 2025.

The finalization of the legislation, which took years, sparked some concern among the crypto community. One of them is the daily transaction limit of 200 million euros for private stablecoins such as Tether.