Portugal Grants First Crypto Exchanges Operating Licenses

• Blockchain Council
• December 28, 2022

For the first time ever, Banco de Portugal has approved operating licenses to regional cryptocurrency trades.

Recently, the central bank gave out the statement that Portuguese-based trades “Mind the coin” and “Criptologia” are now enlisted as virtual assets service providers.

The central bank has issued only these two names in the list on their official website. Banco De Portugal took around nine months to finalize the decision. In September 2020, Criptojola was reported to perform its initial registration to give out its services as a virtual assets provider.

 Mind the Coin and Criptoloja have been given permission to perform crypto exchange services between fiat currencies and different virtual assets within the Portuguese region. Furthermore, they are also allowed to cover various transfer services, safeguarding, and administration works for such assets.

Banco De Portugal has been awarded as one of the most crypto-friendly nations in entire Europe, and the whole continent seems to be proud of it.

In May 2021, Jean Galea, a well-known investor, and blogger said that Portugal is becoming a haven for all the individuals involved in the crypto world in one of his write-ups. Cryptocurrency income continues to be immune from capital gains taxes and VAT in Portugal unless the income is associated with professional trading activity.

Which other European countries are involved in Crypto exchanges?

Nonetheless, Portugal isn’t the only European country to accept crypto trading and services with a warm welcome.

In the final week of May 2021, The Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) granted “XCoins,” a country-based leading exchange provider,  the license to class 3 VFA (Virtual Financial Asset). 

The founder and CEO of XCoins, Rob Frye, stated that Xcoins is dominating the space of digital assets worldwide by standing as one of the earliest cryptocurrency platforms to reach this benchmark implies that they are completely capable of paving the path for an additionally secured and organized industry. 

This is another such authorization the Malta Financial Services Authority has consented to a crypto trade this year. The firstest crypto platform to obtain a VFA authorization of a similar degree was “Crypto.com.” By earning the milestone of receiving the license a couple of weeks before XCoins, the company called this achievement a historic moment for the cryptocurrency world.

Moreover, Crypto.com had previously made a plea to the MFSA to serve as a licensed financial institution, but the plea didn’t get approved. Again this year, the company has presented its plea to the Maltese authority; however, the regulator’s verdict is still not finalized. 

European countries like MFSA and Portugal are surpassing the crypto exchange milestone!

Conclusion 

Further, Criptoloja is currently seeking to bring Portuguese folk together who are interested in investing in crypto assets. However, the service provider company is not confident enough to start accounts in out-of-country trades. Nevertheless, investors say that the tremendous adoption of cryptocurrencies in Portugal is forming a new era of traders.

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