Mr. Robert Ophele, Chair of the French Financial Markets Authority, is a Guest of the Monaco Association for Financial Activities

©Direction de la Communication / Stéphane Danna

On 5 November 2021, the AMAF (Monaco Association for Financial Activities) was host to the Chair of the French Financial Markets Authority at the Forum of French-speaking FIUs, for a lunchtime debate on the issues of cryptocurrencies and the current state of the financial system.

According to Mr. Robert Ophele, "The digitalisation of assets is a major source of innovation," which must nevertheless be regulated at the national level before legislating at the European level.  In this spirit, the 2019 PACTE Law provides a framework for the raising of capital through the issuance of tokens (Initial Coin Offering or ICO) and for monitoring Digital Asset Service Providers (DAPs).  "Today, 25 project holders (ICOs that have received their visa) are registered, and this will increase to 30 by the end of the year," Robert Ophele emphasised.  The analysis of cases of cyber insider trading or cyber dissemination of false information shows that the entire chain of players in the financial world can be affected:  the issuer, bank, disseminator of information, stock market regulator, stock exchange, etc.  As concerns the cases of cyber price manipulation analysed, these stem mainly from hacking private individuals' trading accounts.  Increased international cooperation between regulators is therefore necessary.  It remains difficult, and the international legal framework is still not well adapted.  Active participation in the various international working groups devoted to financial cyber security and the involvement of European institutions are therefore essential to curb this stock market cybercrime.