Australian crypto investors would be in a ‘weird limbo state’ if Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s plans for regulation come to reality. This was observed by TCM Capital’s Fred Pucci who said its citizens are heavily invested in the crypto market ‘to help them buy a house or get ahead, but without the benefit of any safeguards’. The regulatory overhaul in the country includes a licensing regime for crypto exchanges and custody rules for assets and draws heavily on the recommendations of a Senate inquiry chaired by fintech enthusiast Andrew Bragg. Pucci further added,
“Some millennials are taking it to the extreme and putting all bets on. For the Liberals to have a policy that is going to help that market development and be sustained with more of an Australian presence and more Australian protections for investors, is going to be an attractive thing. If you look at the fine print of Treasurer Frydenberg’s document, the timetable for the key planks of this is not going to come through, assuming they win the election and parliament passes the legislation, until mid to late-2022.”
Another expert Chloe White is a former federal insider who feels the crypto industry is looking forward for a policy to be introduced quickly, but it was more important to get things right. ‘Policy that is rushed and poorly designed can backfire, as seen in the case of the New York BitLicense’, She warns. As a matter of fact, the New York administration allocated trading limits on state residents and required capital and on top of that costly licenses that most start-ups struggle to afford.
Crypto regulations in Australia
As per sources, the city-state has created a regulatory sandbox for more than 200 start-ups to play in while authorities keep a close watch. But Pucci noted that only a handful are issued licenses and are closely monitored.
According to an annual survey by Independent Reserve, around 28.6 percent of Australians who do not currently own crypto say they would invest if there were better consumer protections in place. One in three Australian crypto-owners say they would switch their primary bank to one that offers crypto products in the next 12 months, as per research undertaken by the digital payments firm.