Is decentralisation the next evolution of UK financial regulation?

Written by James Kaufmann, partner at Howard Kennedy

With the continued growth in both the range and reach of digital assets, how will financial regulation evolve? To me, there is only one answer; regulation needs to learn from crypto and become decentralised, agile and innovative. Former Twitter CEO, Jack Dorsey (allegedly) said that life happens at intersections. We are at a crossroads. And if we aren’t careful in the UK, we will have let life pass us by. In this article, I summarise the issues and challenges facing those looking to regulate crypto in the UK, and argue that rather than fight it, regulators need to embrace and learn from crypto and distributed ledger technology.

Driven by fear

Advising clients on financial regulatory issues in the UK at this moment in time is a curious thing. On the one hand, we probably have more regulation than ever before to advise on; on the other hand, we find ourselves caught between a commercial world buzzing with new ideas and technologies and (…