In March 2017, the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) issued Information Sheet 219 covering organisations that are considering operating market infrastructure, or providing financial or consumer credit services, using distributed ledger technology (DLT) or blockchain.
ASIC advises that ‘at this stage’ the existing regulatory framework is able to accommodate the DLT. They anticipate that additional regulatory considerations may arise as more applications are developed and they are are therefore seeking early and collaborative dialogue. The information sheet is intended to form part of that dialogue and some of the questions they are interested in include.
1. How will the DLT be used?
2. What DLT platform is being used?
3. How is the DLT using data?
4. How is the DLT run?
5. How does the DLT work under the law?
6. How does the DLT affect others?
To my mind this is already an overkill on the regulatory front, although it has to be said that it is not inconsistent with the global directions as set out in the February 2017 report by International Organization of Securities Commissions.
Also note that the information sheet sets out a laundry list of seven other regulators who potentially may need to be consulted before a DLT projects can be considered ‘fully compliant’.