The British government plans to introduce a regulatory framework for the cryptocurrency industry in early 2025.
The move by the United Kingdom (U.K.) to propose regulations that will govern crypto comes as the European Union's “Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA)” laws take effect.
Analysts and investors have been watching and waiting to see what the new U.K. government of Prime Minister Keir Starmer planned to do related to cryptocurrencies.
Britain’s previous Conservative government had put in place measures to treat crypto like a stock under the Financial Services and Markets Act.
The former government also said that more rules would be coming for stablecoins, which are cryptocurrencies whose value is tied to an underlying asset such as the U.S. dollar.
The new Labour government, elected this past July, says it intends to implement its predecessor's crypto proposals in full.
Under the current plan, stablecoins will not fall under the U.K.'s payments regime. There will also be a carve out for staking to prevent it from being treated like a collective investment scheme.
The European Union, the U.K.'s biggest trading partner, already has its crypto regulations in place.
European rules on stablecoins took effect at the end of June and the rest of the regulations come into effect by year’s end.
The rules across Europe treat digital assets like other tradeable securities and enable crypto-asset service providers with a license in one country to operate across the entire 27-nation European Union.
