An important meeting to regulate cryptocurrencies was held in Istanbul yesterday. Officials of government institutions, managers of cryptocurrency exchanges and relevant department managers of many banks attended the meeting. Although the tax issue is one of the topics that the Turkish cryptocurrency community is most curious about, it was stated that there was nothing to worry the users at the meeting.

With the 2021 bull season, cryptocurrencies attracted great attention from large audiences in Turkey. Increasing prices and easy buying and selling opportunities enabled the Turkish people to adopt this new and technological field.

However, the Thodex exchange incident caused huge losses and prompted state authorities to take swift action. The decrease in prices and the relative decrease in interest in 2022 gave the state time in this regard.

As Minister of Finance Mehmet ?im?ek recently stated, the time has finally come for cryptocurrency regulations. A meeting was held in Istanbul yesterday, attended by CMB, Central Bank, BRSA and MASAK officials, as well as important names in the crypto and finance industry.

In addition to the presence of a significant number of bank managers at the meeting, many banks did not hesitate to send their relevant department managers to the meeting. It was seen that many managers representing cryptocurrency exchanges also participated. However, a noteworthy point was that bank managers were more numerous than stock exchange managers.

The state wants to transfer it to banks

Information from the meeting shows that regulators are not in a rush to address the tax issue, and do not even see this topic as a top priority. This means that cryptocurrency investors can breathe easy, at least for now.

Crypto transfer will be like EFT

Regulators, who do not put too much pressure on users regarding taxes, are preparing to take a very strict stance on other issues. For example, cryptocurrency transfers will be like EFT transactions in banks. The person making the transfer will have to enter his/her name, surname and identification number in the relevant section. KYC (Customer Identification) processes will be carried out in detail like the applications in banks.

CMB will control, TüB?TAK approval will be required

Crypto exchanges that want to operate in Turkey will be subject to the obligation to open a local office. Additionally, the company will need to obtain a CMB license and TüB?TAK will be involved in this process. Tokens and blockchains will be audited by TüB?TAK. However, participants stated that the functioning of this control mechanism may not be as desired. The regulator side will review the audit and try to simplify it.

After realizing that board control could not be done, the state decided to further elaborate the regulation process. Users will be able to continue trading on global exchanges, but they will need to provide detailed KYC information and make transfers accordingly.

There is no problem in DeFi either

The state has decided not to intervene in the field of decentralized finance (DeFi) and will allow tokens to be stored in DeFi wallets and transfers from these wallets depending on the users' wishes. This decision means easing regulatory pressure on DeFi projects. In this way, users will be able to use the DeFi ecosystem more freely.

Leverage is completely banned, Bitcoin ATMs are disappearing

One of the issues that regulators will not compromise on is leveraged transactions, which create great controversy around the world. In this context, leveraged transactions will be completely banned. At the same time, Bitcoin ATMs will also be removed from their locations. The reason for removing ATMs is that they cannot be included in a certain status and location. These regulations aim to bring more order and control to the cryptocurrency industry.

“Our main goal is not prohibition, but control…”

Officials spoke clearly at the meeting and stated that their main goal was not to ban cryptocurrencies in the country, but only to keep them under control and supervision. An official commented, "We do not want to ban. We do not want to make moves that will change the normal flow, but we want to see every move. The important thing is to prevent the transfer of unregistered money... This is also very important in terms of developments in the FATF."

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