🌎 Italy Mulls Tougher Penalties for Crypto Market Manipulation

Italy is reportedly considering increasing fines for crypto crimes as part of measures to reduce market manipulations.

Italy’s government is mulling tougher penalties for those who manipulate the crypto market, citing a draft decree. The proposed legislation, if approved, would impose fines ranging from €5,000 to €5 million ($5,400 to $5.4 million) for crimes such as insider trading, unauthorized disclosure of inside information, and market manipulation. The decree designates the Bank of Italy and market regulator Consob as the primary overseers of crypto activities, with a mandate to maintain financial stability and ensure the orderly functioning of markets.

Regulatory Framework and Stablecoins

In early 2023, the Bank of Italy emphasized the need for a strong and risk-based regulatory framework surrounding stablecoins, aiming to avert a potential worst-case scenario of a destabilizing “run” on these digital assets. The financial regulator particularly highlighted the need for regulatory attention towards stablecoin issuers due to their close ties with decentralized finance.

Supervisory Environment and MiCA

Later on, Italy’s central bank announced the creation of a supervisory environment in anticipation of the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA), the European Union’s forthcoming regulatory standards for the crypto industry. However, it remains unclear whether this supervisory framework has been fully implemented. At that time, Ignazio Visco, then-governor of the Bank of Italy, noted that the central bank’s surveys indicated only about 2% of Italian households held “modest amounts, on average” of crypto, with the exposure of Italian financial intermediaries to the crypto market also being very limited.