Regulation of security tokens as financial instruments in the EU: is there a need for amendments?

2022

In 2020 the European Commission proposed laws on crypto-assets and DLT. The EU treats security tokens as financial instruments, provided that they fall into the MiFID II definition. This Thesis aims to provide classification for crypto-asset as a financial instrument, to identify regulatory gaps in the EU legislation applicable to crypto-assets that qualify as financial instruments (security tokens), and to provide recommendations in relation to security tokens regulation in the EU. The results indicate that Amending Directive will harmonize the procedure for classification of a crypto-asset as a financial instrument across the EU, but the requirement for the expected profit to be derived f…