The legal status of crypto assets could be defined in the UK soon
On November 18th, Lawtech Delivery Panel, more specifically it’s United Kingdom Jurisdiction Taskforce published a public statement, which encompassed the legal grey zone around crypto-assets.
More specifically, the organization was concerned about the classification of Distributed Ledger Technology and smart contracts, which are slowly but surely swallowing up the whole world’s government and private databases.
The public statement mentions the importance of quickly and effectively transition to more regulated and defined legislation for blockchain technology, or else the United Kingdom is in danger of falling behind the rest of the world.
The rest of the world is not an understatement as well. According to some experts, 1/10th of the world’s GDP will be listed on smart contracts by 2027, and there’s only guessing how much of it will take place further down the line in a more long-term system.
Reasons behind vague regulations
At the moment, the UK government has not concerned itself too much with regulating crypto assets and cryptocurrencies, simply due to the fact that there are many more important issues to target.
Things like Brexit have outshined almost every single issue in the country. New budgetary reforms, new trade deals and etc are all being postponed before Brexit is official, with or without a deal.
The reason behind the delays is that there’s a very small chance that the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union could not happen at all, or will happen at the worst terms the island nation could possibly imagine.
Considering that London is named as the financial capital of the world, any talks about serious long-term business is slightly redundant at this point.
Furthermore, panels have been open in the European Union for a while now, where politicians are suggesting a union-wide regulation for cryptocurrencies, which naturally encompasses the blockchain as well.
The United Kingdom cannot necessarily devote itself to these talks too much due to the uncertainties of them being a part of the union in the near future.
Why must there be regulation?
According to Chancellor to High Court and Chair to the United Kingdom Jurisdiction Taskforce, blockchain does indeed represent the future and there is absolutely no doubt about it. What this means is that no matter how much the UK government could try cracking down on new technology, it will still find itself embedded if not in the state-side of operations within the UK, then the private side for sure.
And having a government that does not possess the necessary tools to mediate any misconduct from its private companies is an easy way to introduce chaos and financial fraud to an already stagnating economy.
The blockchain is here to stay. Many have mentioned that Bitcoin is its first success, meaning that everybody anticipates the next step for the system. The next most likely step would be the enhancement of Distributed Ledger Technology and smart contracts.
If the UK refuses to clarify the technology’s understanding within its borders, it risks to completely distance itself from the global financial markets by 2030.
