Mauritius ploughs ahead with digital custodial policy
Chris Hamblin, Editor, London, 27 November 2018
The Financial Services Commission of Mauritius has released a consulative document regarding the Custodian Services (Digital Asset) Licence that it hopes to start issuing to 'fintech' firms soon. This, it says, will enable licence-holders to provide HNW customers with safe-keeping services in relation to digital assets.
The news follows the publication of the FSC 'guidance note' regarding the recognition of digital assets as an asset-class for investment by sophisticated (HNW) and expert (financial professional) investors on 17 September.
In Mauritius, a digital asset is a digital representation of value that can be traded digitally and functions as a medium of exchange and/or a unit of account and/or a store of value but does not have the status of legal tender.
Regulation 21 of the Securities (Collective Investment Schemes and Closed-end Funds) Regulations 2008 requires every collective investment scheme to appoint and have, at all times, a custodian whose function is to take the assets of the scheme into his/its custody for safe-keeping and to deal with those assets in accordance with his/its written agreement with the scheme. Now that the Mauritian state has decided that digital assets are a valid asset class, it wants them to follow this procedure also.
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