King Charles III has officially approved the U.K.'s Financial Services and Markets Bill (FSMB), recognizing crypto as a regulated activity by granting royal assent. The move made the bill an act that will be mandatorily implemented across the country. The royal assent came nearly a week after the 340-page bill was passed by the U.K. Parliament's upper chamber, the House of Lords, in a vote. - The FSMB, first introduced in July 2022, brings cryptocurrencies and stablecoins under the same rules applied to traditional financial assets.
- The act will give the Treasury, Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Bank of England (BoE), and Payments Systems Regulator the authority to introduce and enforce regulations regarding the crypto industry.
- The Treasury has defined the bill as a rocket boost for the U.K. economy.
- The country's Financial Services Minister, Andrew Griffith, also said the regulations related to the crypto assets would support their safe adoption in the country.
U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has shown efforts to make the country a global crypto hub since his finance ministry. - The FSMB is expected to help the U.K., which withdrew from the European Union (EU) in 2020, catch up with the bloc in regulating crypto space.
- Earlier in June, the EU officially signed its most comprehensive, region-wide crypto regulations, the Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA), into law, after three years of development.
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