Bitcoin will go under the regulation known as Sustainable Financial Taxonomy. Those who voted against can now go to the tripartite dialogue.
The draft of the Markets for Cryptographic Assets (MiCA) bill, which has been under discussion since 2020, will finally not include article 2a that proposed to limit digital mining and the use of cryptocurrencies based on the mechanism of proof of work (PoW), like Bitcoin.
However, MPs who raise energy concerns can still appeal and have it reviewed by a tripartite commission.
Members of the European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee voted 32 to 24 against the final version of the European Union bill that sought to limit cryptocurrency mining, as CriptoNoticias reported earlier.
The next step has been a new voting process to approve the document that establishes a regulatory framework for the cryptocurrency industry. This legislation establishes a licensing regime throughout the continent and a single regulation for the Member States.
The proposal with the greatest acceptance was the one presented by the deputy Stefan Berger, who proposes including cryptocurrencies in the scope of action of another European environmental regulation, known as Sustainable Financial Taxonomy.
The Taxonomy Regulation, which has been in force since mid-2021, establishes criteria to qualify an economic or investment activity as environmentally sustainable.
Once approved in a new voting process, the draft MiCA Law will go through a subsequent discussion or tripartite dialogue. The Parliament, the Council representing the 27 member states, as well as the Commission of the European Union, participate in it.
Two months after its approval, the law is likely to enter into force, which could be in the middle of this year.
However, companies will have a 6-month transition period to comply with the requirements, commented on Twitter Patrick Hansen, a member of the community who has closely followed the entire process carried out by Europe to regulate cryptocurrencies.
Europe May Still Ban Bitcoin Mining
Although most members of the European Parliament voted against the article that limited Bitcoin mining, they can still prohibit the activity in Europe. This is because the voters in favor of the ban have one last option since they could try to make their proposal gain strength through tripartite dialogues to take the discussion to the plenary session of Parliament.
“To do that”, according to Patrick Hansen, strategy lead for the DeFi Unstoppable Finance project, “they need 10% of the votes of the European Parliament, which they already have. That would bring the PoW discussion into the high-level political arena. Since we cannot predict how it would play out, that is something that should be avoided. Even if it doesn’t change the vote on PoW, it would unnecessarily delay regulation for at least a couple more months.”
Hansen adds that even outside of MiCA regulation, the discussion about regulating Bitcoin proof-of-work, or mining, has a long way to go. He believes that the debate will return in the framework of the implementation of the rules to include digital mining in the sustainability taxonomy regulation or when the European Union intends to regulate data centers, as it has already warned before.
By Audy Castaneda
