The Central Bank of the Philippines warns the public against using non-local crypto trading platforms.
The pressure on crypto is growing swiftly in the Philippines. After a
recent series of controversial moves from the state regulators and
local think tanks, the country’s central bank published a warning to the
citizens, discouraging them from engaging in any operations with
unregistered or foreign crypto exchanges. The announcement itself
doesn’t sound menacing but taken in the context of accompanying
developments, it makes a 112-million nation a restive region for
crypto.
On Aug.17, The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) published
a warning note to the country’s citizens, “strongly urging” them not to
deal with Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) that are either
unregistered or domiciled abroad.
The Bank emphasized that any
deals with virtual assets are high-risk activities by themselves, and
with foreign platforms, there occurs an additional challenge in
enforcing legal recourse and consumer protection. That leaves the public
with 19 registered VASPs to conduct their operations on.
The list will hardly broaden, at least in the next three years, because a BSP memorandum halted the issue of new VASP licenses
from Sep.1. This is how the BSP understands the delicate balance of
promoting innovation in finance and managing risks.
Perhaps the most intriguing part of the subject concerns one of the world’s largest crypto exchanges, Binance, which is trying to obtain the national license, and, should the BSP memorandum be taken seriously, has less than two weeks to do it.
Read more: Philippines’ digital transformation could make it a new crypto hub
In a recent interview with Cointelegraph, Binance’s head of Asia-Pacific, Leon Foong, said that they have already submitted the relevant paperwork
to acquire the licenses but cannot provide any other details as they
may be confidential. The problem is that the Philippine Securities and
Exchanges Commission (SEC) has already cautioned the public not to invest in Binance, repeating the sentiments of an Infrawatch PH think tank, which had previously lobbied for banning the exchange over alleged illegal promotions.
At
the same time, the Philippines doesn’t consider itself particularly
strict or protectionist in its relationship with the crypto industry. As
the BSP claimed in its written statement to Cointelegraph
on Aug.15, it sees “a lot of benefits associated with crypto and
blockchain.” It is eager to promote a crypto education. In particular,
the BSP revealed its intention to avoid “any significant limits on
crypto investments or trading at this point.” The regulator aims at
“risk-based and proportionate regulations.”
Still, the country remains a hypothetically attractive destination
for crypto. It is considered one of the fastest-growing economies in
the world, and over 11.6 million Filipinos own digital assets, making
the nation 10th globally in terms of adoption.
source link : https://cointelegraph.com/news/the-philippines-pushes-back-against-foreign-exchanges-continuing-a-protectionist-streak
