Can Global Cooperation Achieve Consistent Stablecoin Regulation?

Can Global Cooperation Achieve Consistent Stablecoin Regulation?

In the ever-evolving landscape of digital finance, stablecoins have emerged as a pivotal bridge between traditional and cryptocurrency markets. As their influence grows, so does the imperative to establish a robust regulatory framework.

What are the ins of stablecoin regulation, and where could it be headed in the future?

FSB’s 10 Recommendations

In mid-July 2023, the Financial Stability Board (FSB) published its financial report on the regulation, supervision, and oversight of global stablecoin arrangements.

A total of 10 recommendations were endorsed by the member countries of G20. The FSB’s report reads: “The High-level Recommendations seek to promote consistent and effective regulation, supervision, and oversight of GSCs across jurisdictions to address the potential financial stability risks posed by GSCs, both at the domestic and international level, while supporting responsible innovation and providing sufficient flexibility for jurisdictions to implement domestic approaches.”

One of the key recommendations issued by the FSB is the requirement for stablecoin issuers to secure local licenses before operating in specific jurisdictions.

Explaining why it would be vital for governments to regulate stablecoins, Andrew Silverman, a tax analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, said:

“Stablecoins, in my view, are not significantly different from derivatives, and governments have regulated derivatives for as long as they have existed. Allowing a financial instrument to go unregulated gives people and companies the ability to circumvent the rules simply by using a contract to stand in for an asset, and that opens up opportunities for abuse.”

Silverman added that the introduction of local licenses would allow governments to have broader control over which stablecoin issuers are operating in their jurisdiction. This could also allow governments to periodically obtain information from licensees, which could be the best “disinfectant” to avoid any regulatory or legal issues.

“Countries can also use licensing to keep the holders of licenses current on applicable laws and regulations, both in terms of maintaining current contact information with licensees and requiring acknowledgment of the current set of rules when a licensee renews their license,” Silverman noted.

Singapore, the First Country to Issue Stablecoin Regulation

On 15 August 2023, Singapore’s financial regulator was the first in the world to announce that it had finalized a set of rules on stablecoin regulation.

According to Anndy Lian, the author of NFT: From Zero to Hero, such a move has helped shape Singapore’s reputation as a “global hotspot for cryptocurrencies.” The introduced regulations highlight a number of requirements that include:

  • The reserves supporting stablecoins need to consist of low-risk and easily tradable assets, and their value must always be equal to or greater than the circulating value of the stablecoin.
  • In case of a redemption request, stablecoin issuers are required to reimburse holders with the nominal value of the digital currency within five business days.
  • Issuers are also obligated to furnish users with suitable information, which encompasses audit outcomes of reserves, among other details.

Lian explains, however, that even though introduced, the regulatory framework surrounding stablecoins “remains intricating and swiftly changing.”

“Different governing bodies, whether at the federal or state level, wield varying degrees of jurisdiction over transactions, contingent on the asset’s structure and the specific circumstances surrounding it. In light of this context, Singapore’s decision to finalize regulations for stablecoins holds tremendous significance.

“This step addresses the pertinent regulatory obstacles and boosts the advancement of stablecoins as a reputable medium of exchange within the digital asset ecosystem,” Linn added.

Stablecoin Regulation Going Global

The attempts of several major companies to launch their own stablecoins were previously met with some opposition from governing bodies. At the start of August 2023, PayPal announced the release of its own US-dollar pegged stablecoin – PayPal USD (PUSD). The stablecoin was launched in collaboration with Paxos Trust.

Since both companies are unregulated, meaning they are not examined by a federal banking agency which is why governing bodies are starting to turn towards regulating stablecoins.

But with cryptocurrencies being accessible on a global scale, how can stablecoin regulation be reached?

Bloomberg Intelligence’s Silverman noted that if governing bodies work together, they could communicate a single message. He added that the United States often holds major influence over other countries’ financial decisions, especially in the industry of decentralized finance (DeFi).

“Having an impact on US law-making indirectly influences other countries’ rule adoption. I would note, however, that consistent stablecoin regulation is not necessarily the ideal for all.  Companies and individuals that can arbitrage differences in countries’ stablecoin regulation could benefit from those distinctions.”

Lian added that Singapore’s stablecoin regulations could “potentially become a template for other nations grappling with their own regulatory frameworks.”

“Given Singapore’s standing as a meticulously overseen financial hub, its method of handling stablecoin regulations might emerge as a beacon for countries seeking to establish their own guidelines. Nevertheless, it is essential to acknowledge the swiftly evolving and intricate nature of the regulatory environment surrounding digital currencies.”

Can Stablecoin Regulation Prevent Another Market Meltdown?

Stablecoins are unique due to their ability to keep a 1:1 peg with the asset they are paired with, oftentimes the US dollar. However, on 9 May 2022, stablecoins made headlines when one of the biggest coins in the category – terra USD (UST), broke its peg from the US dollar.

UST’s collapse had led to major losses in the cryptocurrency industry, with many investors losing trust in stablecoins, fearing another collapse may be inevitable.

Silverman explained that by regulating stablecoins and essentially excluding speculative and volatile assets from supporting stablecoins, the assets could become “safer investments, or at least it will allow them to be viewed as safer investments.”

“I think the sentiment is good, but it could actually have the opposite effect. People viewed money market funds and collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) as entirely safe before the financial crisis when that didn’t turn out to actually be the case. Perhaps, speculative and volatile assets will, in fact, be successfully barred from being included in stablecoins. Perhaps not.”

He added: “A safe asset can always quickly become volatile under the right circumstances. Giving people the impression that a financial instrument is entirely safe when it’s almost certainly never possible to guarantee safety is not ideal from a policy perspective.”

Lian suggested that regulation ensuring that the reserves supporting stablecoins focus on low-risk and highly liquid assets could function as “a safeguard, tethering the stablecoin’s value to assets that are less prone to drastic value wings and can be readily transformed into cash when necessary.”

The Bottom Line

Stablecoins have represented a significant milestone in the cryptocurrency industry by attempting to offer stability and versatility in an otherwise volatile industry.

Silverman noted that all regulations are intended to offer protection without doing much harm to the assets being regulated, however, every regulation has the potential to weigh in favor of companies or individuals.

“The impact of regulations and their interpretation also changes over time, so what is beneficial to companies today could be better for individuals in the future. We will see how things shake out. If a regulation is truly harmful it tends to be struck down in court or over-written by statute. There are checks and balances. The downside, of course, is that everyone has to put up with a subpar regulation for some time until it is changed.”

Source: https://www.techopedia.com/can-global-cooperation-achieve-consistent-stablecoin-regulation

Anndy Lian is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur who is known for his work in the government sector. He is a best selling book author- “NFT: From Zero to Hero” and “Blockchain Revolution 2030”.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. Prior to his current appointments, he was the Chairman of BigONE Exchange, a global top 30 ranked crypto spot exchange and was also the Advisory Board Member for Hyundai DAC, the blockchain arm of South Korea’s largest car manufacturer Hyundai Motor Group. Lian played a pivotal role as the Blockchain Advisor for Asian Productivity Organisation (APO), an intergovernmental organization committed to improving productivity in the Asia-Pacific region.

An avid supporter of incubating start-ups, Anndy has also been a private investor for the past eight years. With a growth investment mindset, Anndy strategically demonstrates this in the companies he chooses to be involved with. He believes that what he is doing through blockchain technology currently will revolutionise and redefine traditional businesses. He also believes that the blockchain industry has to be “redecentralised”.

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Linfinity and Seele signed a strategic cooperation agreement to create a new ecosystem of supply chain

Linfinity and Seele signed a strategic cooperation agreement to create a new ecosystem of supply chain

Recently, Linfinity and Seele signed a strategic cooperation agreement in Taipei to carry out in-depth cooperation in the field of blockchain technology to jointly build a new ecosystem of supply chain industry.

As a pioneer in the deployment of blockchain technology into supply chain, Linfinity is committed to building the world’s first trusted, traceable supply chain ecosystem based on blockchain technology. This cooperation, combined with Seele’s advanced system development and engineering technology and Linfinity’s rich commercial resources and innovative business operation model, focuses on tackling the main pain points of the supply chain industry, and jointly promotes the commercialization of the blockchain in the field of supply chain.

Dr. Zheng Maolin, CEO of Seele, said, “We are very pleased to have this cooperation with Linfinity. As a representative of Blockchain 4.0, Seele’s neural network consensus algorithm has reached the highest processing speed of the global public chain system and highly matched the multi-node of the supply chain industry.”

Anndy Lian, CEO of Linfinity, said, “The supply chain ecosystem is a new application scenario of blockchain technology. This collaboration will further integrate Linfinity’s rich commercial resources and operations capabilities and Seele’s neural network-based consensus algorithms to equip the supply chain ecosystem with a powerful engine to accelerate the weaving of the supply chain ecosystem. Starting with the mutual trust, transparency and efficient management of the upstream and downstream supply chain, the commercialization of blockchain on supply chain is expected soon.”

 

Blockchain is an epoch-making technology, and its powerful inner vitality lies in the integration of industrial practices. 2018 is a key year for the development of blockchain business. With its leading blockchain technology and innovative business operation model, Linfinity has already started business cooperation with Alishan Group, WealthBriefingAsia, Scientific Tradition, Rongde Logistics, RHTLaw TaylorWessing LLp, RHT Holdings, Crossinvest and other international companies. This strategic cooperation in between Seele and Linfinity will inject new momentum into the development of the blockchain in the supply chain.

 

About Seele:

Seele is a blockchain 4.0 platform that aims to spearhead development in the Internet of Value era. It aims to solve the scalability, security, and efficiency problems found in current blockchain networks by developing a heterogeneous, multi-chain ecosystem powered by a novel Neural Consensus Algorithm. Seele’s objective is to build the Internet of Value for the future.

https://www.linfinity.io/article/31.html

Anndy Lian is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur who is known for his work in the government sector. He is a best selling book author- “NFT: From Zero to Hero” and “Blockchain Revolution 2030”.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. Prior to his current appointments, he was the Chairman of BigONE Exchange, a global top 30 ranked crypto spot exchange and was also the Advisory Board Member for Hyundai DAC, the blockchain arm of South Korea’s largest car manufacturer Hyundai Motor Group. Lian played a pivotal role as the Blockchain Advisor for Asian Productivity Organisation (APO), an intergovernmental organization committed to improving productivity in the Asia-Pacific region.

An avid supporter of incubating start-ups, Anndy has also been a private investor for the past eight years. With a growth investment mindset, Anndy strategically demonstrates this in the companies he chooses to be involved with. He believes that what he is doing through blockchain technology currently will revolutionise and redefine traditional businesses. He also believes that the blockchain industry has to be “redecentralised”.

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Linfinity and Alishan Group Enter into a Strategic Collaboration Agreement to Formalise their Mutually Beneficial Cooperation

 

SINGAPORE – 26 June, 2018 – Linfinity and Alishan Group have formally signed a strategic collaboration agreement to jointly build a trustworthy and traceable anti-counterfeiting supply chain system based on blockchain technology. This is another milestone after Linfinity’s MOU signings with six organizations worldwide, which have seen the launch of pilot blockchain projects across various industries — Wealth Briefing Asia, Scientific Tradition, Rongde Logistics, RHTLaw Taylor Wessing LLP, RHT Holdings and Crossinvest.

According to the agreement, both Linfinity and Alishan Group will have access to each other’s resources to launch a comprehensive partnership integrating blockchain into the supply chain. These shared resources include Alishan Group’s products and funds and Linfinity’s front-end blockchain technology and human resources. Dr. Yu, CTO of Linfinity, stated that “The current global supply chains are slow and inefficient, and consumers are increasingly demanding the transparency of product sources, which is consistent with the direction of the company’s development. With reliable data, transparent information and interconnected network, this collaboration with Alishan Group enable Linfinity to achieve the traceability of the whole supply chain, from source to end consumers, speeding up product flow and reducing counterfeit costs.”

Linfinity Introduces Blockchain Technology to Alishan Group’s Supply Chain to Combat Proliferation of Counterfeit Goods

 

Through this collaboration with Alishan Group, Linfinity will create an anti-counterfeiting traceability system for their entire supply chain – from manufacturers and carriers to distributors and the end consumers. Manufacturers submit digitally signed product information to the chain, which ensures that the product source information cannot be tampered with. Subsequently, carriers, distributors, and consumers submit abstracts of the commodity circulation information to the chain, ensuring that the logistics information, ownership information and the order of circulation cannot be tampered with.

Through these tamper-resistant products, source, proprietary and transfer order information, the number of security checks needed will significantly lessen resulting in a faster flow of goods. From the perspective of dynamic game mechanism, the end-consumer can verify whether the ownership of purchased goods belongs to the retailer before purchasing a product, which can prevent counterfeit goods from circulating on the chain. Once a counterfeit product is found, its origin can be easily traced by using an algorithm to analyze the real information in the supply chain. The digital signature ensures the authenticity of all participants within the supply chain. Considering the cost of production, time spent, and inflated sales numbers involved in the counterfeit goods industry, Linfinity will be able to eradicate the problem of fake goods in the supply chain ecosystem. In addition, due to the automatic clearing and settlement technologies in each segment Linfinity can greatly promote the value circulation of the supply chain ecology, saving a significant amount of labor costs and red tape.

The strategic collaboration with Alishan Group will further promote the cooperation between Linfinity and Alishan Group from end to end, marking another important development for Linfinity within the blockchain industry. Mr. Anndy Lian, CEO of Linfinity, said, “There are endless possibilities for Linfinity’s blockchain technology to integrate into different supply chains. As we advance into an era where such technology is expected, Linfinity wants to be the frontrunner in transforming the supply chains across industries to ensure the authenticity of products and services and help to promote trust among different players. Regardless of industry, it is time for innovation and to capitalize on new opportunities. Our upcoming plans will continue to increase awareness of the benefits of blockchain technology, as well as to start more collaborative pilot projects to transform supply chains in different sectors globally.”

About Linfinity

Linfinity is committed to building a reliable and traceable anti-counterfeiting supply chain underlying blockchain technology. Linfinity establishes such a platform with reliable data, transparent information, efficient cooperation and interconnected network to cope with the practical business pain points and development demand of corporate users.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Linfinity+and+Alishan+Group+Enter+into+a+Strategic+Collaboration+Agreement+to+Formalise+their+Mutually+Beneficial+Cooperation&ei=ZpA1W720PIKWzwL5qJbQAg&start=90&sa=N&filter=0&biw=1536&bih=747&dpr=1.25

http://www.newson6.com/story/38517092/linfinity-and-alishan-group-enter-into-a-strategic-collaboration-agreement-to-formalise-their-mutually-beneficial-cooperation

Linfinity and Alishan Group Enter into a Strategic Collaboration Agreement to Formalise their Mutually Beneficial Cooperation

Anndy Lian is an early blockchain adopter and experienced serial entrepreneur who is known for his work in the government sector. He is a best selling book author- “NFT: From Zero to Hero” and “Blockchain Revolution 2030”.

Currently, he is appointed as the Chief Digital Advisor at Mongolia Productivity Organization, championing national digitization. Prior to his current appointments, he was the Chairman of BigONE Exchange, a global top 30 ranked crypto spot exchange and was also the Advisory Board Member for Hyundai DAC, the blockchain arm of South Korea’s largest car manufacturer Hyundai Motor Group. Lian played a pivotal role as the Blockchain Advisor for Asian Productivity Organisation (APO), an intergovernmental organization committed to improving productivity in the Asia-Pacific region.

An avid supporter of incubating start-ups, Anndy has also been a private investor for the past eight years. With a growth investment mindset, Anndy strategically demonstrates this in the companies he chooses to be involved with. He believes that what he is doing through blockchain technology currently will revolutionise and redefine traditional businesses. He also believes that the blockchain industry has to be “redecentralised”.

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