Bonjour a Crypto!
After a year of regulatory scrutiny, the crypto giant Binance is working to get back on its feet in France.
The crypto industry's largest centralized exchange will be financing a 100 million euro ($113M) initiative with industry group France FinTech in order to support the blockchain and cryptocurrencies sector.
In November, Binance announced their latest initiative: Objective Moon. This will see them establish a research and development office in France as well as collaborate on an incubator program for startups or training programs to help French entrepreneurs get started with blockchain technology!
The future of cryptocurrency is bright. But it will take a village to make this dream come true!
The aim of the objective moon, as seen by David Prince from Binance's FrenchGM team was really "to develop an ecosystem," and he believes that you can't do any one thing alone in helping out with developing new technologies or fostering growth of cryptocurrencies throughout all stages - whether its research & development (R&D), commercialization services like paymentwall which offers password managed Blockchain technology.
Driving this is the primary mission of this project, which is: facilitate the building of a network for educators and learners. It allows folks from all over the globe access educational programs in subjects such as science or languages that they would otherwise not have been able to without it being available on their home turf where there are limited resources, which leaves them unable to succeed academically because there isn’t enough help locally.
France is a hotbed of innovation in the finance industry, with many startups popping up to take on high-tech offerings. This year has seen particularly fruitful funding rounds for two companies: Lydia, who raised $72 million USD earlier this summer and Qonto whose total value now stands at about 80 million dollars following their recent Series C investment round by asset management firm LVMH.
Binance has had a difficult year in its relationships with regulators around the world. Amongst these headaches were an investigation by Britain's Financial Conduct Authority and Canada’s nationalator- regulator, who accused them of not having enough rules to prevent money laundering tokens on their exchange platform during last months' token sale event which led Binance shut down some features until they can be approved again later in the future.
Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao has spoken out in favor of regulation and continues to purport his vision of facilitating and working with regulators as the official mission for their operations.
However, the CEO seemed tight-lipped about whether this investment was a precursor for establishing their headquarters in France.
The Central Bank of France has expressed concern over Binance’s plans to operate in the country. The bank said that they must ensure strong anti-money laundering checks before setting up operations here, which is a requirement for any financial service provider operating within France's borders.
However, this move hasn't gone unnoticed by watchdogs-- last month, it was reported Governor Mark Carney made comments similar to those from Andrea Enrich during his speech at Chatham House where he addressed cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin being used by criminals rather than legitimate users.
Cryptocurrency businesses are still figuring out how to navigate the ever-changing landscape of regulation. One such example is Europe, where cryptocurrency exchanges must follow new rules set by MiCA - but it doesn't seem like this will be easy for them!
The European Union is moving to create a single regulatory system for cryptocurrencies. The new framework, known as MiCA (which stands for “multi Crypto Account”), will introduce greater investor protection and expand the licensing of digital currency firms across Europe in an effort made at reducing uncertainty among crypto businesses currently operating within each individual member state's laws.
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
