Turkey’s Minister of Treasury and Finance, Mehmet Şimşek, has unveiled some details of the forthcoming cryptocurrency regulation in the country. The government plans to provide legal definitions to key concepts in cryptocurrency, adhere to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) standards, and license trading platforms.
On January 10, Şimşek confirmed to the Anadolu Agency that the cryptocurrency framework for the Turkish market is nearing completion, with the technical aspects of its implementation currently under evaluation. The Minister highlighted the government’s aim to minimize the risks of cryptocurrency trading for regular investors, in line with international standards.
“We are taking steps to reduce the risks of parties trading with crypto assets in our country, similar to international practices. This is also within the scope of FATF to get out of the gray list,” Şimşek stated. The new guidelines will require cryptocurrency platforms to secure licenses from Turkey’s Capital Markets Board (CMB). They will also provide legal definitions for terms such as “crypto assets,” “crypto wallets,” “crypto asset service providers,” “crypto asset custody service,” and “crypto asset buying and selling platforms.”
Şimşek provided an example of the definition of crypto assets: “[…] intangible assets that can be created and stored electronically using distributed ledger technology or a similar technology, distributed over digital networks, and capable of expressing value or rights.” He added that the regulations will not include a specific tax regime for virtual assets.
Turkish authorities have been contemplating regulations for its cryptocurrency market for a while, focusing on licensing and taxation to remove the country from the FATF’s “grey list”. Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis reports that between July 2022 and June 2023, Turkey ranked fourth globally in raw cryptocurrency transaction volumes, with approximately $170 billion in activity, trailing only the United States, India, and the United Kingdom.
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| Information | Details |
|---|---|
| Geography | Middle East |
| Countries | 🇹🇷 🇺🇸 🇮🇳 🇬🇧 |
| Sentiment | neutral |
| Relevance Score | 1 |
| People | Mehmet Şimşek |
| Companies | Turkey’s Capital Markets Board (CMB), Financial Action Task Force (FATF), Chainalysis, Anadolu Agency |
| Currencies | None |
| Securities | None |
