EU Finance Commissioner to Propose Unified Crypto Legislation

The European Union’s finance commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis has pledged to propose new rules to regulate cryptocurrencies such as Facebook’s Libra.

As Reuters reports, speaking before EU lawmakers on Oct. 8, Dombrovskis stated:

“Europe needs a common approach on crypto-assets such as Libra. I intend to propose new legislation on this.”

Dombrovskis’s role

Having served as Latvia’s prime minister and finance minister and as a member of the European Parliament in 2004–2009, Dombrovskis now seeks reappointment as the executive vice president of the European Commission.

If reappointed, he would be tasked with a brief labelled "An Economy that Works for People" and continue to be responsible for the Commission's financial services portfolio and its work to “deepen Europe’s economic and monetary union,” as president-elect Ursula von der Leyen outlined.

In addition to underscoring the need for new cryptocurrency-specific legislation in Europe, Dombrovskis spoke of the EU’s need to tackle “unfair competition, cybersecurity, and threats to financial stability.”

EU finance ministers are hostile to Libra

On Oct. 7, Cointelegraph reported that Germany’s finance minister Olaf Scholz has stated that he is “very, very skeptical” of Facebook’s Libra project.

The social media titan’s proposed stablecoin has also received a frosty response from French finance minister Bruno Le Maire, who has gone so far as to say that Libra should not be authorized on European soil as it would imperil the monetary sovereignty of states.