The law, which should be presented for public comment in the coming days, will officially define cryptocurrency in the rapidly expanding sector.
The first cryptocurrency bill in Morocco could be tabled "in the next days." The Central Bank has already written the document, which will be discussed with key players in the sector.
Abdellatif Jouahiri, the governor of Bank Al-Maghrib (BAM), the central bank of Morocco, announced a series of meetings between the BAM and the market participants late last month during a press conference. Participants in the regulation process include the Moroccan Capital Markets Authority (AMMC), the Insurance Supervisory Authority, and the Social Security (ACAPS). It will go into effect before the crypto law.
Jouahiri claims that the BAM worked on the document in conjunction with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. According to earlier reports, Moroccan officials also got in touch with the central banks of France, Sweden, and Switzerland to learn more about how they handle regulation of digital assets.
The draught will provide a definition of cryptography that is "tailored to the Moroccan context" and aims to safeguard people without stifling innovation. Although the bill's specifics were kept a secret, it is impossible to imagine it being more restricted than the current law, which completely forbids the trade of cryptocurrencies.
Morocco had the fastest-growing cryptocurrency market in Northern Africa in 2022, with a population ownership rate of 3.1% in 2022 compared to 2.4% in 2021. The first blockchain-powered wind farm will be installed by Soluna in 2020 in Dakhla, Morocco's most windy and southern region. The crypto mining operations are powered by the farm's extra energy.
According to a new research from Chainalysis, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) area has the world's fastest-growing cryptocurrency sector. Users in the MENA region got $566 billion in cryptocurrencies between July 2021 and June 2022, according to transaction volume. This represents an increase of 48% from the prior year.
( David Attlee, Cointelegraph, 2023)