Uruguay’s executive power proposes crypto regulation: El Observador
proposed to Uruguay’s parliament for consideration, suggests putting virtual asset service providers into a “new category” of businesses, the newspaper said. These businesses would ultimately answer to the Superintendent of Financial Services , which is part of Uruguay’s central bank.
These virtual asset service providers, known as PSAVs for their acronym in Spanish, are defined as entities that professionally offer virtual asset services to third parties on a regular basis. Such activities include the custody and exchange of virtual assets among one another or to fiat currency. The bill would require “all entities that operate with virtual assets” in Uruguay to be subject to global anti-money laundering standards, no matter whether they are part of the country’s financial system. El Observador explains that the bill would also update Uruguay's securities market law to put crypto assets under the definition oSo far, it is unclear how the bill might move through Uruguay’s bicameral General Assembly.
According to the text of the bill, Uruguay’s central bank defines virtual assets as a “virtual representation of value or contractual rights that can be stored, transferred and negotiated electronically through distributed ledger technology or similar technologies.” Blockchains fall within the wider DLT category, the text clarified.
The bill then goes on to describe different classifications of virtual assets, with categories including virtual asset securities, virtual assets of utility, “stable” virtual assets such as stablecoins and central bank virtual currencies , and virtual assets of exchange such as bitcoin and ether.