Cryptocurrency may be in for widespread international regulation as fears of tax and sanction evasion cause more and more pressure toward the development of an international crypto regulatory framework.
What Happened: Kazushige Kamiyama, the head of the Bank of Japan's payment and settlement systems, said that policymakers from G7 member countries — the world's top seven economies — should jointly enact international crypto regulations, according to a Thursday Reuters report.
He is reportedly worried that digital assets could be used as a loophole against sanctions such as those imposed on Russia.
Cryptocurrencies make it easier to circumvent conventional payment means using fiat currencies and that "using stablecoins, it's not very difficult to create an individual global settlement system," Kamiyama said.
Policymakers of G7 countries need to quickly understand how to update rules that are insufficient to combat the problems introduced by digital assets, he said. Furthermore, he pointed out that "G7 nations are now working together on this front, while sharing information on current developments."
The news follows recent reports that European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde said market data backs her belief that Russian actors are using cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) to circumvent sanctions.
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