Crypto Market Plunge Relieves Britain’s Regulators

The sudden decrease in the price of Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum, and other cryptocurrencies lately has lifted a heavy weight off the shoulders of crypto market regulators in the U.K.

n the past couple of years, especially after the tremendous boom in the crypto market in 2017, we have seen a series of rules and regulations being enacted to monitor virtually every activity which takes place in the crypto market. This is as a result of the ridiculous spike in the price of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in 2017. This spike, which made the crypto market as lucrative as it can ever be, caused an rapid increase in the popularity of the crypto world.

To curb this new craze, which was perceived as dangerous, countries across the globe had to rise up to the task and make new sets of rules and regulations to ensure their citizens are protected from financial frauds that may arise in the crypto market. The pressure to regulate a new set of digital assets that no one fully comprehends was overwhelming to regulators as they have to keep formulating new rules and regulations to catch up with trends in the crypto sphere.

Although this has curbed the level of crime a bit, it wasn’t an easy task for Britain’s crypto market regulators or the international crypto market regulators. Reuters reports that the sudden decline in the value of crypto assets, which was attributed to a decrease in the number of crypto investors and enthusiasts, has relieved these crypto market regulators of the herculean task they were saddled with.

This is so because the craze was reduced drastically and, accordingly, it is expected that there would be a significant reduction in fraudulent incidents recorded in the crypto market. Both sellers and buyers have reduced greatly in number. The lower the popularity of cryptocurrency, the lower the rate of crime in the vicinity.

According to Reuters, the British regulators and government officials told in a conference that their primary focus at the moment is on how two thousand or more crypto assets slot into existing rules before they would start considering reforms. The deputy director for financial services at Britain’s finance ministry, Gillian Dorner, said in City and Financial conference that they want to take the time to give a closer look at that and take an approach accordingly.

The executive director for strategy and competition at the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Christopher Woolard, said that there is an urgent need to clarify ‘grey edges’ surrounding the existing regulatory perimeter to ascertain which crypto asset falls within the FCA’s existing regulatory perimeter and those that fall outside. He stressed that the FCA will consult by the end of 2018 to determine where the perimeter lies for crypto assets. He also added that after the clarification, the finance ministry would then consult to ascertain if the perimeter itself needed adjustment.