A project was presented by the Financial Superintendence of Colombia to clarify how virtual asset service providers and banks will interact in the future. This document describes key concepts as well as outlines a list of requirements banks must meet before they accept virtual asset service provider customers.
Colombia Regulates Virtual Asset Services Providers
Latam is a country where crypto adoption is increasing at a rapid pace and regulation is a priority. The Financial Superintendence of Colombia (FSCo) has now presented a document that outlines the standards cryptocurrency exchanges and custodians must comply with in order to be accepted as bank customers. Key concepts like virtual asset service providers, or VASPs (virtual assets within the regulation) are defined in this project.
It also stipulates that all virtual asset service providers must be connected to the UIAF (the financial intelligence office in Colombia) and that they have a plan to address money laundering or terrorism financing attempts made via their platform.
This project indirectly refers to compliance with travel rules promoted by Financial Action Task Force. The VASPs are required to be confirmed by banks.
Technology and operational capabilities to enable transactions with virtual assets to be monitored, preserved and transmitted, in addition to the identification of both the source and beneficiary.
Additional Requirements
This proposal stipulates that VASPs should be able present to their customers clear information on the services they provide, their risks, costs and any virtual assets.
VASPs will also have a plan to deal with operational and cybersecurity-related risks to handle possible hacks or platform problems that might affect how their services are delivered to their customers. Banks will be required to seperate their responsibility from VASPs. Customers can then be assured that VASP-related issues are solely between them and the platforms.
Additionally, the proposal imposes investment restrictions. The proposal states:
Supervisory entities authorized to collect resources using deposit products or money must make sure that all operations of withdrawal and deposit of resources in financial products, deposit or funds are done only via non-face-to face channels.
The Financial Superintendence will continue to receive comments about the proposal until August 12, although it is still being discussed.
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