The COVID-19 pandemic has ravaged the economies of countries all around the world and is showing no signs of stopping. The overwhelming response from global governments has been to place their countries under full or partial lockdowns. This has arguably saved many lives, but the economic fallout has been savage. The United States alone is on track to see a record 30% rate of unemployment and an unprecedented 30% drop in gross domestic product. China, the European Union, Japan and the United Kingdom aren’t faring that much better. In such uncertain times, investors are naturally nervous. After the massive crash …

Major cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase is rolling out Tezos (XTZ) staking rewards for users in the United Kingdom and three European countries. In an announcement on May 28, the exchange revealed that users in the U.K., France, Spain and the Netherlands are now eligible to earn interest on their XTZ holdings for depositing and holding the token on the exchange. According to Coinbase, since this feature was launched in the United States back in November, users have earned over $2 million in XTZ staking rewards. What is staking? In blockchains that use a Proof-of-Stake system, staking enables network participants to earn …

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) aren’t really easy to spend in day-to-day life, mainly because retailers prefer to stay away from crypto’s volatility. In order to build a bridge between traditional finance and emergent assets like Bitcoin, a Swiss crypto startup called Eidoo has introduced a new Visa crypto debit card that uses regulated stablecoins for crypto-to-fiat conversion. The so-called Eidoo Card has been approved for operation by payment giant Visa. Announcing the news on May 25, Eidoo told Cointelegraph that its new card will enable 40 million Visa merchants to accept crypto-derived fiat currencies, including the British pound (GBP) and …

Per a May 20 announcement from Banque de France, France has become the first country to successfully trial a digital euro, operational on a blockchain, following a call for new technology to back such a development at the end of March The bank says it tested a sale of securities for central bank digital currency (CBDC) on May 14, signalling the beginning of more robust testing. Wholesale rather than retail CBDC Though the bank’s announcement did not go into great detail, it did indicate that the current pilot program is focusing on wholesale rather than retail uses for a digital …

Payments and cryptocurrency platform, Crypto.com, announced a broad European launch of its MCO Visa cards. The cards will soon ship to 31 countries in the region, according to the company’s blog post, published May 15. The company’s European presence now covers all 27 EU member states, as well as Switzerland, the UK, Iceland, and Norway. The firm claims to have “the most widely available crypto card in the world” as a result of this expansion. Prior to this, it had already been offering services in Asia and the US. When asked how difficult it was to get the green light …

By spring 2020, it became inescapable that we now live in a world with an unraveling future. The once-imminent shift, now fueled by the coronavirus outbreak, has accelerated the pace of technological adoption, and the financial field was among the first industries to accept it. The shift from a cash-based culture to card payments in many conservative European countries became even more notable, alongside a growing interest in cryptocurrencies and stablecoins in particular. What once might have required a few more years of crypto maturity became urgent as physical cash became a potential virus transmission vector, while new levels of …

Hackers infected the IT infrastructure of the largest private hospital in Europe with ransomware. Cybersecurity news outlet, KrebsonSecurity, reported on May 6 that hackers compromised the IT systems of Germany-based private hospital, Fresenius. An anonymous source reportedly informed the outlet that the hospital’s systems were infected by the ransomware known as Snake. The ransomware in question was discovered earlier this year, and is being actively used to target large businesses. Fresenius spokesperson, Matt Kuhn, reportedly confirmed to KrebsonSecurity that the hack took place: “I can confirm that Fresenius’ IT security detected a computer virus on company computers. [...] As a …

German security token offering (STO) platform Black Manta Capital Partners partnered with local digital asset custody firm Finoa to develop institutional security token custody. According to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph on May 4, the cooperation aims to develop a regulated security token custody solution explicitly aimed at institutional investors, high net worth individuals and corporations. Black Manta and Finoa will first collaborate on securing the tokens of the Berlin STO that has tokenized $12 million worth of real estate announced last month. Per the announcement, Finoa is a Berlin-based digital asset custodian that holds a crypto custody license issued …

A blockchain association has partnered with the European Commission and University College London (UCL) to coordinate blockchain solution providers in addressing the coronavirus pandemic. The organization, called the International Association for Trusted Blockchain Applications (INATBA), was founded at the behest of the EU last year. Its current effort brings together various public and private entities in a “COVID Task Force,” the purpose of which is to activate blockchain solutions that could fix some of the indirect challenges of the pandemic. Specifically, the task force will identify enterprise blockchain solutions that could improve governmental, social and commercial challenges. As not all …

The Dutch Ministry of Finance’s implementation of the European Union’s fifth anti-money laundering directive, or AMLD5, requires the country’s Central Bank to monitor its cryptocurrency industry. The cost of this supervision will be passed on to crypto-based businesses. A recent report suggests that these new compliance fees will be higher than those paid by traditional trust and credit card companies. One directive, twenty seven varieties AMLD5 was supposed to bring increased transparency and a unified approach to anti-money laundering measures across the EU. But the varying member states have each implemented different interpretations of the directive, often prioritizing their own …

The lack of uniformity among different jurisdictions’ cryptocurrency laws makes it difficult for crypto exchanges seeking to expand to new markets. While some countries are embracing and fostering innovation, others are more hostile to Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies. Further exacerbating the difficulty is the lack of regulatory certainty in many jurisdictions, including the United States. Below are four of the most significant international regulatory milestones so far in 2020. The European Union’s AML rules now apply to cryptocurrency exchanges The European Union’s Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism rules now apply to crypto custodians, such as wallets …

As the European Commission finished its public consultation on cryptocurrency assets in March, France’s major financial regulator stepped in to express its stance on the matter. The Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF), the stock market regulator in France, has published an official response to the EC consultation, outlining some basic proposals regarding their own vision for crypto assets within the EC’s approach. It’s too early to establish a classification of crypto assets In an April 7 statement, the AMF argued that the classification of crypto assets should be based on the existing categories in order to differentiate between crypto assets …