In a letter to the European Commission in March, the payment giant PayPal said it is “monitoring the evolution of the crypto-asset space” and has taken “unilateral and tangible steps to further develop its capabilities in this area.” The payment giant has accelerated its process since the Libra stablecoin project was announced in June 2019. PayPal was among the Libra project members for about four months before it withdrew in October 2019, along with other payment giants such as Mastercard and Visa.
PayPal is said to be working to offer crypto buying and selling.
The payment giant PayPal’s revelation holds importance as it is said to be in the works to offer crypto buying and selling to its over 300 million users. PayPal’s response to the commission is part of a public consultation that opened in December last year. The commission wanted feedback on building an EU framework for crypto-assets. The payment giant said that blockchain and crypto-assets could help achieve “greater financial inclusion and help eliminate some of the pain points in financial services today.
PayPal wants the commission to set clear definitions of various crypto activities to ensure satisfactory consumer and investor protection. PayPal has also suggested the commission to put crypto-activities within the scope of applicable anti-money laundering rules.
Countries across the world continue to strengthen crypto regulations.
Crypto regulations in most countries are in a grey area, but over the last couple of years, governments have started taking the crypto industry seriously and make regulations accordingly. Earlier, the Financial Action Task Force had proposed guidelines to regulate the crypto industry to its 37 member countries. Since then, several countries have moved forward in this direction and have enforced these guidelines to some extent. South Korea, Singapore, and European countries have set crypto regulations over the last few years. Several other countries are also working on enforcing these guidelines.
