The Gibraltar Stock Exchange is quietly preparing for a corporate takeover that could have global consequences.
Regulators are reviewing a proposal that would prompt blockchain company Valereum to buy the Gibraltar Stock Exchange in 2022, according to The Guardian newspaper.
This means that the British territory could soon host the world’s first integrated exchange, where conventional bonds can be traded alongside major cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and dogecoin.
Valereum is focused on providing technology to link major mainstream currencies, such as the pound and the dollar, with crypto assets.
While countries such as China and the United Kingdom have openly banned or opposed investments in crypto assets, Gibraltar is going against the trend and has committed to formally regulating cryptocurrencies in an attempt to protect the territory as a financial center in the future. .
This move comes as Gibraltar is struggling to shed its reputation as a global tax haven.
Albert Isola, Gibraltar’s minister for digital, financial and public services, told The Guardian that while Gibraltar was a tax haven 20 years ago, it has now revised its tax and information-sharing policies. The introduction of crypto regulation is having a similar effect: rooting out bad actors and providing security for investors.
“If you wanted to do bad things in crypto, you would not be in Gibraltar, because the companies are licensed and regulated, and they are not anywhere else in the world,” said Isola.
Gibraltar’s regulator has so far approved 14 cryptocurrency and blockchain companies for its licensing scheme, which attracted the attention of former Sirius Minerals chairman Richard Poulden, who chose Gibraltar for Valereum’s cryptocurrency exchange project.
Valereum, he said, is trying to tap into a cryptocurrency sector worth roughly $ 3.5 trillion, almost the combined value of all companies listed on the London Stock Exchange.
Other countries will be watching closely. Neil Williams, deputy director of complex crimes at London-based Reeds Solicitors, said: “If it is a success, I would certainly think that other jurisdictions would seek to follow it,” he told the British outlet.
However, experts have warned that Gibraltar could face sanctions from countries like the United States if its regulators end up giving legal approval to money launderers.
A month before Valereum announced its offering for GSX in October, the head of the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Gary Gensler, stated that, as an asset class, cryptocurrencies were “more like the wild west … plagued fraud, scams and abuse “. in certain applications”, raising further concerns about the possibility of criminal funds leaking into the general financial system.
But Gibraltar insists that it has welcomed blockchain companies with wide eyes, having consulted on its regulation for the sector for four years before introducing it in 2018.
“I don’t understand how there can be a greater risk in Gibraltar, when today you can go to any other European country and do exactly the same business without being supervised, without a license and without being regulated. So how can we be more exposed by regulating them? It’s the opposite, ”said Isola.
Reference-www.eleconomista.com.mx