Tessline is the investment firm behind Liracoin, and now that it’s been suspended, we might have a precedent that allows Italian regulators to put some restrictions on cryptos.
On the 4th June 2019, Italy’s CONSOB, issued a notice of suspension to the aforementioned investment firm, Tessline.
According to the notice, all the digital assets associated with Tessline and Liracoin, too, must be terminated due to a violation of Art. 18 of Italy’s Consolidated Law of Finance.
This is the result of the suspension of all of the activities of the firm involved in offering and promoting products based on cryptos for 90 days, as well as promoting any other investment product.
This action, however, isn’t totally unexpected: Tessline has been warned in the past and flagged for breach of compliance rules. It happened, for example, back in February, when the Central Bank of Ireland issued a formal warning.
Whether it’s the first time the regulators take action against the firm or not, shall we see this as an attempt to tighten the rules of the crypto market?
What happens now to the crypto industry?
Tessline did hit a few strikes already, but the fact that a decision by a regulator like the CONSOB came in this very moment, it’s likely to set the pace of the law makers for the times ahead, so it’s interesting to try and forecast what’s next, and we can do so, because this isn’t the first time that something like this happens.
In fact, two other firms have been sanctioned by the CONSOB because they allegedly took part in a cryptocurrency fraud, not long ago.
For that reason, CONSOB released a joint statement with the Maltese FSA about unlicenced crypto exchanges.
Furthermore, CONSOB has been sending more notices like the one sent to Tessline since November 2018, it’s just that the last name was more widely known.
As we can see, Italy is taking the matter seriously, trying to halt all suspect activities in the crypto industry, in order to protect people from frauds, which are undoubtedly growing at a worrying rate.
Not only with unlicenced exchanges, but also with irregular securities or any kind of fraudulent activity, CONSOB is really striving to make investments in cryptos more transparent, so its intervention is much appreciated.
However, it’s just scratching the surface: according to a recent report by Business of Crypto, $1.7 billions have been stolen from exchanges in 2018, and this figure is 400% higher than the previous year.
Hidden mining and fake investment projects are the most common scams. In the same report, in fact, it comes out that hidden mining reports grew by 4000% in 2018, and 4 million of them were found in Q3 alone. Criminal activities related to cryptos are growing exponentially and they’re growing very fast.
The fact that authorities like CONSOB are taking this seriously, can only be positive not only for Italy, but for the EU as a whole, creating a safer investment environment for everyone.
Transparency must be achieved through proper regulations and punishment procedures for criminals. On the long term, everyone will benefit from it and people will feel safe investing in innovative blockchain projects.
The role of blockchain legal consultants will become more and more important.
