The European Union stands ready to regulate cryptocurrencies if risks from the sector are not tackled at the global level, the bloc’s financial services chief said on Monday.
A global investment craze over bitcoin and other virtual currencies in the last year has seen wild gyrations in their valuations, making fortunes for some investors while others have lost heavily, Reuters reported.
“This is a global phenomenon and its important there is an international follow-up at the global level,” Valdis Dombrovskis told reporters.
“We do not exclude the possibility to move ahead (by regulating cryptocurrencies) at the EU level if we see, for example, risks emerging but no clear international response emerging.”
Dombrovskis was speaking after hosting a roundtable attended by the European Central Bank, industry bodies, and the Financial Stability Board, which writes and coordinates regulation for the Group of 20 Economies.
G20 finance ministers and central bankers meet in Buenos Aires in March, with cryptocurrencies set to be on the agenda. The EU will decide how to address the issue later this year or early in 2019, the financial services commissioner said.
