- Australia’s digital assets industry sees this year’s election as the most important ever, as it steps up efforts to engage with lawmakers and push crypto regulation to the top of the political agenda.
- Several Australian cryptocurrency exchanges have made donations to both major parties, including Swyftx and BTC Markets, with Coinbase saying it plans to donate.
- The industry view is that lack of action has led to Australia lagging its neighbours on crypto regulation, meaning it has to play catch-up to avoid losing start-ups.
There’s a sense across Australia’s digital assets industry that this year’s federal election is shaping as the most important ever for the future of the nascent industry, according to a report published today by Capital Brief.
In a reflection of the importance the industry places on this election, many Aussie-based cryptocurrency exchanges have stepped up their political lobbying efforts to educate legislators on the benefits of cryptocurrencies and distributed ledger technology (DLT) for Australia’s economy.
Several exchanges — including BTC Markets and Swyftx — have also put their money where their mouths are and contributed financially to both major parties, seeking to push regulation of the digital assets industry to the top of the legislative agenda regardless of which party forms government post-election.
Related: Could The Election Hinge on Aussie Crypto Voters? Poll Results Point to Yes
Exchange CEOs: Education Of Legislators “Imperative”, Election “Crucial”
Jason Titman, the CEO of Brisbane-based crypto exchange Swyftx, confirmed that his exchange has made financial donations to both major parties in the lead up to the election. He added that he believes it’s “an imperative” that the Aussie crypto industry “educates lawmakers and the public on the role of blockchain technology and its potential to support the financial goals of Australians”.
Titman has also been vocal of late about how Australians are motivated to vote on crypto issues — pointing to new research that shows 59% of Aussie crypto holders would vote for a pro-crypto candidate.
As an industry, we know our customers want clear rules that protect local investors and support competition and innovation. No one wants the status quo.
Jason Titman, Swyftx CEOAnother of Australia’s leading crypto exchanges, BTC Markets, recently made its largest ever political donations. Its CEO, Caroline Bowler, told Capital Brief that this year’s election was “crucial” for the Aussie digital assets industry:
What we’ve donated to both parties is the most we’ve ever donated politically. This for us is the crucial election… I’m not so big-headed as to think this is the only issue based in the country, but god damn it — we can’t miss this opportunity again.
Caroline Bowler, BTC Markets CEOThe Australian arm of the leading US-based crypto exchange, Coinbase, has reportedly not yet made any political donations but is working on its donation plan and will be making contributions in due course. Coinbase has also been running an education and awareness campaign targeting politicians known as ‘Stand With Crypto’ since November of last year.
Other major exchanges, including Kraken and Binance, haven’t declared publicly whether they’ve donated to either major party — but Kraken Australia managing director, Jason Miller, told Capital Brief that the exchange has increased its political lobbying efforts “due to the urgent need for regulation in Australia’s crypto landscape”.
Regulatory Reform Could Unlock Crypto’s Potential, Boosting Aussie Economy
The Aussie digital assets industry has been calling for regulatory reform for several years to provide guidance and certainty to institutions and to enhance investor protections.
Just last week the newly appointed CEO of crypto exchange OKX Australia, Kate Cooper, said her previous experience working at major banks NAB and Westpac had shown her that the major impediment to large scale institutional adoption of crypto is a lack of regulatory clarity.
Cooper said she believes if the winner of the election acts fast to implement appropriate regulation we could see huge adoption of crypto by Aussie financial institutions and “a proliferation of activity with stablecoins”.
Following his attendance at a recent event run by the Digital Economy Council of Australia (DECA) at Parliament House, crypto-focused lawyer John Bassilios said it was a “pivotal time for the regulation of digital assets”.
We look forward to working with our politicians in developing fit for purpose regulation for digital assets in Australia rather than shoe horning #digitalassets into the existing financial services regime which does not contemplate decentralised financial products.
John Bassilios, Partner at Hall & Willcox and Director of DECABoth major parties have talked a big game about implementing ‘fit-for-purpose’ regulation of the digital assets industry in the next term of government, but both parties also have pretty poor records when it comes to actually doing anything on crypto.
Related: OKX Australia CEO Predicts “Proliferation” of Stablecoin Use Post-Election, If Laws Keep Up
During the coalition’s last stint in government little progress was made towards regulation, and Labor — despite teasing regulation — have continued slow-walking crypto legislation. Australia now lags badly behind neighbouring jurisdictions like Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan.
This means Australia is now in a position where it needs to play catch to avoid losing innovative start-ups and economic activity to its more forward-looking neighbours. This prompted Bowler to warn:
If either of them don’t come good on the promises, then watch the reaction of a crypto community that’s agitated.
Caroline Bowler, BTC Markets CEOCredit: Source link
