Digital and Blockchain-based Legal Regimes: An Eea Case Study Based on Innovative Legislations – Comparison of French and Liechtenstein Domestic Regulations

Authors

  • Bianca Lins University of Liechtenstein
  • Sébastien Praicheux University of Paris-Sorbonne

Keywords:

Blockchain, Blockchain Act, digital assets, Distributed Ledger Technology, electronic money, financial instruments, PACTE Law, payment instruments, Token container model, Token

Abstract

The financial crisis of 2007/08 had shattered the global financial system and led – besides a flood of regulations – to a wide range of new concepts and business models. One of these new concepts was “Bitcoin”, a private digital monetary system, which is characterized by decentralization, transparency and immutability. To date the underlying Blockchain or Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) has evolved and offers an extensive range of possibilities, particularly in the financial industry. So far, an EU-wide legal basis for Blockchain or DLT applications and services is missing. France and the Principality of Liechtenstein took a step forward and adopted national laws trying to offer legal certainty in this field. This article aims to provide a comparison of the two acts and underline the similarities and differences.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Hofert. E.: Governance in Blockchains, in: Siebeck. M, Regulierung der Blockchains Hoheitliche Steuerung der Netzwerke im Zahlungskontext [Regulating Blockchains : Sovereign control of the Networks in the Context of Payments],Tübingen : Mohr Siebeck, 2018.

Layr. A ., Marxer. M .: Rechtsnatur und Übertragung von "Token" aus liechtensteinischer Perspektive [Legal Nature and Transfer of “Tokens” from a Liechtenstein Perspective], Liechtensteinische Juristen-Zeitung (LJZ) [Liechtenstein Legal Journal], 11 (17), 2019.

Raschauer N ., Silbernagl R.: Grundsatzfragen des liechtensteinischen "Blockchain-Gesetzes" [Questions of principle of the Liechtenstein “Blockchain Act” – TVTG], Zeitschrift für Finanzmarktrecht (ZFR) [Journal of Financial Market Law ], 11 (16), 2020.

Legal Acts

Directive 2009/110/EEC of the European Parliament and the Council of 16th September 2009 on the taking up, pursuit and prudential supervision of the business of electronic money institutions, OJ L 2009/267.

Directive 2014/65/EU of the European Parliament and the Council of 15th May 2014 on markets in financial instruments, OJ L 2014/173.

French Ordinance on Crowdfunding, n° 2014-559, 30th May 2014.

French PACTE Law 2019 : Action plan for the growth and transformation of businesses, n° 2019-486, 22nd May 2019.

Liechtenstein AIFMG Act 2012, concerning the Managers of Alternative Investment Funds.

Liechtenstein Amendment of Property Law Act 2016.

Liechtenstein Blockchain Act 2019, on Token and TT Service Provider.

Liechtenstein UCITSG Act 2011, concerning specific undertakings for collective investments in transferable securities.

Liechtenstein Persons and Companies Act of 20th January 1926.

Proposal COM(2018) 113 final for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on European Crowdfunding Service Providers (ECSP) for Business.

Proposal COM/2020/593 final for a Regulation on Markets in Crypto-assets.

Other Official Documents

Blockchain Use Cases in Healthcare, Report, EU Blockchain Observatory and Forum, 2020. Available at: https://www.eublockchainforum.eu/sites/default/files/reports/report_healthcare_v1.0.pdf, accessed: June 1st 2021.

EC, Consultation Document on an EU framework for markets in crypto-assets, 4. Available at: https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/info/files/business_economy_euro/banking_and_finance/documents/2019-crypto-assets-consultation-document_en.pdf, accessed: June 1st 2021.

EBA, Report with advice for the European Commission on crypto-assets, 9 January 2019, 13. Available at: https://www.eba.europa.eu/sites/default/documents/files/documents/10180/2545547/67493daa-85a8-4429-aa91-e9a5ed880684/EBA%20Report%20on%20crypto%20assets.pdf, accessed: June 1st 2021.

Report and Application of the Government to the Parliament of the Principality of Liechtenstein concerning the creation of a Law on Tokens and TT Service Providers, Nr 54/2019 Available at: https://www.naegele.law/files/Downloads/2019-07-12_BuA_TVTG_en_full_report.pdf, accessed: June 1st 2021.

Internet Resources

PWC: Liechtenstein plays a pioneering role in government regulation of the crypto-financial market. Available at : https://www.pwc.ch/en/publications/2018/crypto-liechenstein.pdf, accessed: 5th February 2021.

Downloads

Published

30.06.2021

How to Cite

Lins, B. ., & Praicheux, S. . (2021). Digital and Blockchain-based Legal Regimes: An Eea Case Study Based on Innovative Legislations – Comparison of French and Liechtenstein Domestic Regulations. Financial Law Review, (22(2), 1–17. Retrieved from https://czasopisma.bg.ug.edu.pl/index.php/flr/article/view/6161

Issue

No. 22(2) (2021)

Section

Articles

License

Financial Law Review is an open access journal which means that all the articles published are freely available without charge to the reader or his/her institution.

The articles published in Financial Law Review are available under a licence Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) 

The Author furnishes a non-exclusive and free-of-charge license to use the his Work without territorial limitations and for an unlimited period.

Archiving policy

All texts from the journal Financial Law Review are published in electronic version. We strive to archive texts in various databases. Archival issues are also available on the platform of the Academic Scientific Journals: https://czasopisma.bg.ug.edu.pl/index.php/flr/index

Moreover articles published in the journal are archived at the Repository of the University of Gdansk.