In a busy week for news, let's take a look back at the news stories that dominated the worlds of Forex , fintech and crypto, in our best of the week segment.
ASIC Officially Adopts Curbs on Selling CFDs to Retail Investors
By far the biggest news story of the week was The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) officially announcing restrictions on selling contracts for difference (CFDs) to retail clients.
Amongst a swathe of restrictions, regulated firms have now been forced to limit the Leverage they can offer on currency pairs to a maximum of 30:1.
The rules also mandate negative account protection, ensuring that customers cannot lose more than their trading stake, avoiding a repeat of the debacle following the 2015 Swiss Franc collapse. Finally, the rules forbid bonuses and other incentives, whether monetary or non-monetary, that may have encouraged overtrading in recent years.
Read more on the ASIC CFD Curbs here.
CFTC Issues Advisory Mandating New Rules for Crypto Deposits
This week, the CFTC issued an advisory expanding the notifications and reporting requirements for virtual currencies held by futures commission merchants (FCMs).
The new rules build upon the CFTC’s existing customer protection regime, as amended by Dodd-Frank, under which FCMs are required to segregate from their proprietary assets all money, securities and other assets deposited by customers. Additionally, it is intended to enhance these protections and to specifically address systemic risks posed by the nature of virtual assets that surrounded the recent hacks of crypto exchanges.
Read more on the CFTC new rules here.
PayPal to Launch Crypto Services in the ‘Coming Weeks’
As Finance Magnates reported this week, the PayPal crypto saga continues. The company officially confirmed that it will allow cryptocurrency purchasing, selling and holding on its platform.
Although no launch date was given, PayPal stated it will allow its users to pay using digital currencies to all 26 million merchants on its network by early 2021.
Read more on the PayPal crypto confirmation here.
USGFX, Stripped of Aussie License, Sets Up Shop in South Africa
FX broker Union Standard International Group Pty Ltd (USGFX) has been awarded a license by South African regulator, the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) to offer financial trading services in the country.
In August, the board of USGFX announced that the headquarters of the brokerage will be moved from Australia to London.
The cancellation of the USGFX AFS licence follows on from the broker being ordered to enter into liquidation by the Federal Court of Australia in August.
Read more on the USGFX South Africa Move here.
OKEx, BitMEX, & More: Are BTC Holders Losing Trust in Crypto Exchanges?
In a Finance Magnates analysis, we looked at the reasons why the amount of BTC that was being kept on cryptocurrency exchanges was at its lowest point in months.
We delved into two recent incidents regarding two large cryptocurrency exchanges that may have served as an extra incentive for traders to get their coins out of exchange accounts as quickly as possible, though, in both cases, hackers were not involved. Instead, the trouble came from the law enforcement side of things: specifically, last week’s arrest of OKEx founder, Star Xu, as well as the indictment of the four co-founders of BitMEX that took place earlier this month.
Read more on the BTC decline and on losing trust in crypto exchanges here.
Tax Fraud? J5 Probes ‘100s of Accounts’ at Peter Schiff’s Euro Pacific Bank
As Finance Magnates reported this week, ‘Hundreds of accounts’ at the Puerto-Rico based Euro Pacific Bank, founded by renowned millionaire broker and Bitcoin sceptic, Peter Schiff, have been placed under international investigation in relation to allegations of tax evasion.
However, the allegations of tax-related criminal activity may not be the bank’s only issue. It was reported that “the bank’s security was also a problem,” and that “at one point, Russians tried to extort the bank for a ransom of 1000 bitcoins, worth millions of dollars.”
Read more on the J5 Probe at Peter Schiff's Euro Pacific Bank here.
