Consob (Consob is the control authorithy of the Italian financial market) and Bankitalia (Italian central bank) advise the community and especially small traders to pay more attention to the high risks associated with crypto-asset operations that may involve the full loss of the sums of money used.
The same direction was also followed by Eba, Esma and Eiopa, the three European banking supervisory authorities, which drew the attention of consumers to the high risks associated with the purchase and holding of crypto-assets, underlining, moreover, the need for a unitary regulation in the European context.
The Crypto-Assets Task Force of the European Central Bank defined a crypto-asset as "a new type of asset recorded in digital form and made possible by the use of cryptography which is not and does not represent a credit or a liability of an entity. identifiable".
Consob and Bankitalia say that there is a notable growing interest on the market, at European and international level, in crypto-assets such as Bitcoin (a crypto valued and a global payment system created in 2009 by an anonymous inventor), but the lack of a unified regulatory framework presents multiple risks:
- the scarce availability of information on how prices are determined;
- the volatility of the prices;
- the complexity of the underlying technologies;
- the absence of legal and contractual safeguards;
- the absence of information obligations on the part of operators and of specific forms of supervision on these operators;
- the absence of rules to safeguard the sums used.
On the other words, the risk of losses due to malfunctions, computer attacks or loss of access credentials to electronic wallets, acquire greater importance in relation to the dissemination of forms of offers through the digital channel that allow a large community to easily carry out of purchases.
The EU Commission has proposed to create a regulation to be able to control the issuance, the offer to the public, the provision of services and the fight against market service abuses in relation to the different types of crypto-assets; the approval process for this proposal is in progress.
A well-defined legal framework would ensure market integrity and greater protection of consumers and savers.
To date, the purchase of crypto-assets is not regulated by the laws on the transparency of banking products and investment services, and, moreover, it is not controlled by the supervisory authorities.
For this reason, Consob and Bankitalia have highlighted that adherence to offers of financial products in relation to crypto-assets, such as the so-called Digital token is a risky investment, particularly if the offers are made by abusive operators and not regulated by the Authorities.
