Weekly Digital Assets Regulatory Brief: Week 26-2026

Facts: On 22 June 2026 the Bank of England published a policy statement and draft Code of Practice for sterling-denominated systemic stablecoins. The Bank dropped its earlier proposal for per-holder caps (20,000 pounds individual / 10 million pounds business) in favour of a temporary aggregate issuance guardrail set initially at 40 billion pounds per systemic stablecoinA cryptocurrency pegged to a stable asset, such as USD or gold. Reserves must be held 70% in short-term UK government debt (residual maturity up to six months) and 30% in non-interest-bearing central-bank deposits, with par redemption within 24 hours, statutory-trust segregation, and a prohibition on paying interest to coinholders. The consultation runs to 22 September 2026, with final rules targeted by end-2026 and implementation from 2027.

Facts: In the final week before the MiCAThe EU's comprehensive regulatory framework for crypto-assets, establishing harmonized rules for issuers and service providers across all 27 Member States deadline, several firms secured authorisation. On 23 June 2026 Ripple received preliminary CASPEntity providing crypto services under EU MiCA requiring authorization and regulatory compliance approval (a CSSF "Green Light Letter") in Luxembourg which, combined with its existing EU Electronic Money Institution licence, enables regulated cryptoasset and stablecoinA cryptocurrency pegged to a stable asset, such as USD or gold payment services across the 30-country EEA through a single integration. NAGA Group's entity NAGA X and payments firm OpenPayd both announced MiCA authorisations on 24 June covering trading, custody and stablecoin services, while Italy's Conio (Consob / Bank of Italy) had cleared its CASP licence days earlier.

Facts: On 23 June 2026 the European Parliament's Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON) committee adopted its position on the single-currency package, backing the digital euroProposed CBDC issued by European Central Bank to complement cash and private payments framework by 43 votes to 14 with one abstention. The texts provide for online and offline versions of an ECB-issued digital euro, with cash-like privacy offline, ECB-set holding limits to protect bank deposits, free basic services, and a 12-month pilot from mid-2027 ahead of a possible first issuance in 2029. Negotiating mandates head to the July plenary before trilogue with the Council, which agreed its position in December 2025.

Facts: On 23 June 2026, as part of a coordinated US action against Cambodia's Prince Group, FinCEN issued a notice of proposed rulemaking to amend its October 2025 Huione Group designation to add H-Pay Service PLC (a rebrand of the sanctioned Huione Pay) and any successor entities as a "primary money laundering concern," severing them from the US financial system. The same day, the DOJ announced the seizure of cloud backend infrastructure used by Huione subsidiaries to launder billions in crypto investment-fraud and scam proceeds, and OFAC added related designations.

Facts: Dubai's Virtual Assets Regulatory AuthorityDubai's independent regulator for virtual assets and crypto activities in the emirate (VARA) issued enforcement measures and financial penalties against MX Global (operating as MEXC) and KuCoin for providing broker-dealer and exchangeA platform where users can buy, sell, or trade cryptocurrencies services to customers in Dubai without a VARA licence (MEXC's breach spanning 2022 to April 2026, with KYCA process where exchanges and financial institutions verify user identity failures), directing them to cease and desist. Separately, VARA penalised already-licensed CoinMENA for AMLRegulatory framework requiring financial institutions to detect and prevent money laundering, terrorist financing, and other illicit financial activities programme compliance failures found during inspection. VARA did not publicly disclose the fine amounts.

Facts: On 26 June 2026 Vietnam's government adopted a national action plan to combat money laundering, terrorism financing and proliferation financing, with the explicit objective of exiting the FATFGlobal standard-setter for combating money laundering and terrorist financing's increased-monitoring list. The plan instructs authorities to implement risk-based supervision for financial institutions and designated non-financial businesses and to "take action to regulate virtual assetsFATF term for digital value representation tradable or transferable electronically and virtual asset service providers."

Facts: At its 17-19 June 2026 plenary, the FATFGlobal standard-setter for combating money laundering and terrorist financing approved a seventh targeted update on implementation of its virtual-asset standards and announced a new targeted report on DeFiFinancial systems built on blockchain that operate without intermediaries like banks money-laundering exposure. The grey list was reshuffled: Iraq and Bosnia and Herzegovina were added, while Algeria and Namibia were removed, leaving 22 jurisdictions under increased monitoring. The plenary reinforced the supervisory expectations set out in the FATF's Best Practices on Travel RuleRequirement to share sender and recipient information for crypto transactions above a threshold Supervision (first published June 2025), and the incoming UK Presidency flagged scam compounds and fraud as priorities.

Facts: Delaware's General Assembly passed a three-bill package now on the governor's desk. SB 16 (Banking Modernization Act) defines "digital asset" and "virtual currency" and authorises Delaware banks and trust companies to holdA misspelling of 'hold,' used to mean holding onto cryptocurrency for long-term gains and manage digital assets. SB 19 (Payment StablecoinA cryptocurrency pegged to a stable asset, such as USD or gold Act) creates a licensing regime for stablecoin issuers under the State Bank Commissioner with 1:1 reserve requirements modelled on the federal GENIUS ActUS law (July 2025) requiring payment stablecoin issuers to be regulated entities with 1:1 reserve backing. SB 18 (Money Transmission and Virtual Currency Modernization Act) adopts the CSBS model framework already enacted in 30+ states. Parts of SB 16 take effect immediately; SB 19 phases in with GENIUS directives; SB 18 after one year.

Facts: At its 24 June 2026 plenary session, Korea's Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC) fined Bithumb 210 million won (about 136,000 US dollars) and issued a corrective order. The PIPC found Bithumb shared its TetherThe largest stablecoin by market cap, pegged 1:1 to the US Dollar and issued by Tether Limited (USDT) order-book data with overseas exchanges from September to November 2025: users had consented to a transfer involving one exchangeA platform where users can buy, sell, or trade cryptocurrencies (Stellar), but member numbers and order data were routed to another (BingX). It also flagged the sharing of names, walletA tool for storing, sending, and receiving cryptocurrencies addresses and, in one case, dates of birth with 13 overseas exchanges for AMLRegulatory framework requiring financial institutions to detect and prevent money laundering, terrorist financing, and other illicit financial activities checks. The PIPC simultaneously released blockchainA decentralized, digital ledger of transactions maintained across multiple computers-service privacy guidelines warning against placing identifying data on-chain.

Facts: On 26 June 2026 the SECU.S. federal agency regulating securities markets and protecting investors and CFTCU.S. federal agency regulating derivatives markets including crypto commodity futures issued a joint request for public comment on harmonising portfolio-margining frameworks across securities, security-based swaps, futures, swaps and related positions, with a 60-day comment window. The request builds on the agencies' 11 March 2026 memorandum of understanding and comes ahead of US Treasury clearing mandates expected by end-2026. Regulators asked for input on cross-margining, collateral eligibility, risk-management standards and customer protections.

Facts: On 26 June 2026 the European Banking AuthorityEU agency supervising banking and stablecoin regulation across member states opened a consultation on a methodology for calculating fines in its role as supervisor of significant asset-referenced tokens (s-ARTsCrypto token under MiCA that maintains stable value by referencing multiple assets) and significant e-money tokens (s-EMTsCrypto token under MiCA that maintains stable value by referencing a single fiat currency) under MiCAThe EU's comprehensive regulatory framework for crypto-assets, establishing harmonized rules for issuers and service providers across all 27 Member States Article 131. The two-step approach sets a basic amount and then adjusts for aggravating and mitigating factors, with fines of at least 5 million euros or 3% to 12.5% of total annual turnover depending on the infringement.

Facts: On 27 June 2026 ASICSpecialized hardware designed for mining cryptocurrencies efficiently extended its sector-wide no-action position for digital-asset businesses providing financial services to 30 September 2026 (from 30 June), giving firms three more months to apply for or vary an Australian Financial Services (AFS) licence, and broadened it to cover authorised-representative and intermediary arrangements. ASIC has received roughly 30 licence applications since updating Information Sheet 225 in October 2025, and the Corporations Amendment (Digital Assets Framework) Act 2026 is expected to take effect around April 2027.

Facts: Kenya, grey-listed by the FATFGlobal standard-setter for combating money laundering and terrorist financing in February 2024, is accelerating AMLRegulatory framework requiring financial institutions to detect and prevent money laundering, terrorist financing, and other illicit financial activities/CFT reforms to exit increased monitoring, with virtual-asset risk a named focus. Building on the Virtual AssetFATF term for digital value representation tradable or transferable electronically Service Providers Act 2025, authorities are tightening crypto oversight and beneficial-ownership frameworks as part of the action plan reviewed by the FATF through 2026.

Facts: StablecoinA cryptocurrency pegged to a stable asset, such as USD or gold infrastructure and payments firm Yellow Card announced it has obtained AMLRegulatory framework requiring financial institutions to detect and prevent money laundering, terrorist financing, and other illicit financial activities affiliation in Switzerland as a supervised financial intermediary, operating from Lugano. The status brings it under Swiss AML/CFT obligations and provides a regulated baseCoinbase's Ethereum Layer 2 network using Optimism's OP Stack, designed for low-cost, high-speed transactions with Coinbase ecosystem integration to offer stablecoin-based cross-border capital flows into emerging markets alongside Swiss and other banking partners.

Facts: On 26 June 2026 the Monetary Authority of SingaporeSingapore's central bank and integrated financial regulator overseeing banking, insurance, and securities added the decentralised exchangeA platform where users can buy, sell, or trade cryptocurrencies Hyperliquid to its Investor Alert List, flagging that it is neither licensed nor authorised in Singapore. The addition follows Bybit, KuCoin and Bitget on the same list. Hyperliquid responded that, as permissionless infrastructure with user self-custody, it has never claimed to be MAS-licensed; MAS clarified the listing is not an outright ban.