Should Central Banks Make Binance Their Friend or Foe?

[Haamsaaveni (Hamsi) Kumar]

The central bank (CB) of the Netherlands has fined Binance more than 3mn euros for offering their services without properly registering the company. However, the CB said the fact that Binance has since applied to be registered and thereby reducing its total fine. Regulators have been split on what to do with Binance with UK’s FCA stating Binance cannot be supervised because it offers products that are significantly risky to consumers but France, Spain and Italy have opened their respective doors to the exchange.

Do you see more countries taking the cautious approach or be open to welcoming Binance and other similar exchanges to their countries?

Let us know what you think!

[Andrew Spencer]

I think it’s a good question.

This comes as Binance is currently being investigated for potential securities violations in the US, alongside further warnings in South Africa, Thailand and the Cayman Islands that it was not authorised to operate locally.

When Binance started 5 years ago, it appears that there was very little regularly framework in place to affect a decentralised business and little interest in compliance from Binance. However, as the regulatory scrutiny increased we have also seen Binance setting up local offices and local compliance teams to satisfy regulators.

I think that regulators are still catching up with these emerging technologies and the fines will be significantly larger than $3 million for perceived non-compliance with local regulations in the near future.

It will be interesting to see the result of their US investigation!

[Author]

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