Australia's financial regulatory agency expands its oversight of cryptocurrency

On October 29th, as per the report by Decrypt, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has provided a substantial update to its digital asset guidance. This update expands the scope of existing financial services laws to cryptocurrency businesses and clarifies the circumstances under which digital asset products and services may be regarded as financial products under the Corporations Act. The latest update replaces early cryptocurrency-related terms with the more comprehensive term "digital asset", encompassing tokenization, digitization, and token-based products. ASIC has reiterated that many digital assets, such as yield tokens, staking arrangements, and asset-referenced stablecoins, may necessitate an Australian financial services license in accordance with current laws. The regulator also emphasized that if offshore and decentralized platforms market or sell to local users, Australian law is equally applicable. The new custody obligations require companies holding client assets to meet a net tangible asset threshold of up to AUD 10 million.