MFSA issues in-principle approvals for VFA Agents

The 14 VFA Agents will serve as first level of defence for market integrity and public interest

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The MFSA has today issued the in-principle approvals foe regestriation of 14 VFA Agents, who applied for registration in November 2018.

VFA Agents will be assisting users as well as service providers under the Virtual Financial Assets Act, and will be making applications to the MFSA on their behalf.

The VFA Agent will serve as a first line of defence for market integity and public interest as these agents are required to evaluate their clients' business plans and fitness and properness, prior to submitting an application to the MFSA. The VFA Agents are also subject persons under the Prevention of Money Laundering and Funding of Terrorism Regulations.

The VFA Agent will need to perform a thorough due diligence on their clients and would need to continue supporting the MFSA, by providing the necessary information during post-registration supervision.

Christopher P Buttigieg, Head of Securities and Marker Supervision, commented that "the issuance of these in-principle approvals is an important milestone in the MFSA's effort at becoming a regulator of excellence in the field of the reguation of crypto assets. We have worked actively since November 2017 when we started our regulatory journey in the field of crypto assets and today, we have a complete framework that caters for all key areas of risk, being inter alia the risks to consumers, market integrity, financial crime and cyber security. We have now, 17 weeks after the receipt of the first set of applications, started to authorise entities in this sector."

Upon registration, a list of these approved entities will be made available on the MFSA website. 

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