Due to a “technical” delay, the final voting on the momentous Markets in Crypto Assets Regulation (MiCA) bill by the European Union has been postponed once more, and it will now happen in April 2022.
A representative for the EU Parliament confirmed the delay and stated that difficulties were encountered when translating the roughly 400-page document into the 24 official languages of the union.
The MiCA and other legal documents must be made available in all of the union’s 24 official languages. The MiCA vote has now been delayed twice due to problems with its translation.
The vote on the legislation was originally scheduled for November, but it was postponed until February for the same reason as today. The European Securities and Markets Authority and the European Banking Authority will have to wait 12 to 18 months after the bill is approved to create the technical standards.
So this constant delay in the voting will also delay the implementation of the MiCA, as a result, the law won’t take effect until at least 2024.
In July 2022, the EU agreed on MiCA Regulation for crypto assets & stablecoin. The agreement, which is presumed to be the first major regulatory framework for the crypto industry, mandates that stablecoin issuers maintain a sufficiently liquid reserve.
In a nod to environmental issues, after a proposed proof-of-work (PoW) mining ban was taken off the table, the MiCA law will also ask crypto miners to reveal their energy usage.
In addition to guaranteeing stablecoin issuers have sufficient reserves on hand to support redemptions, MiCA intends to develop a licensing scheme for exchanges and wallet providers.
The Transfer of Funds Regulation (TFR), scheduled to be put into effect concurrently with MiCA, will now be voted on in April. KYC data must be included in crypto transfers according to the TFR on both the recipient and receiver sides.
