Bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchanges operating in Brazil were surprised by the new rules of the Central Bank of Brazil (BC) regarding the use of the Pix electronic payment system.
The BC published BCB Resolution No. 293, which establishes new rules for Pix, focusing on the institutions that offer Pix-as-a-service and their clients, as well as the “transactional accounts” used by exchange houses and cryptocurrency companies that offer Pix to their users
William Lee, Head of Crypto at InvestSmart XP, stated that the new resolution directly affects cryptocurrency exchanges and that the move adds new regulations and prohibitions for companies that outsource and partner with other companies to provide the Pix service to their clients.
The cryptocurrency community is concerned that the new rules will make it even more difficult for companies in the sector to access the traditional financial system. Additionally, the BC Resolution could increase operational and regulatory costs for exchanges, which already face many challenges in meeting ever-changing regulatory demands.
Meanwhile, the exchanges continue to study the BC resolution and assess their options to adapt to the new rules. However, the situation remains uncertain, and the next steps for cryptocurrency exchanges in Brazil will depend on how the regulation is applied and interpreted.
Central Bank Determines Greater Control over Transactions via Pix
The Central Bank of Brazil (BC) clarified, in a recent live, that the new Pix rules aim to solve the problem related to third parties, such as cryptocurrency exchanges, offering Pix without being ecosystem participants and concentrating movements on a transactional account.
This makes it difficult for BC to monitor financial transactions using Pix, as well as to identify money laundering and other illicit financial transactions.
BCB Resolution No. 293 establishes the end of May as the deadline for companies to adapt to the new model. Last year, a similar problem affected Banco Capital and the institution’s partner companies that offered Pix to their users.
As a measure, Capitual changed its system and began to identify its clients’ users, which led Binance to break up with the bank and join the Latam gateway.
Exchanges Still Don’t Know Exactly What to Do
The objective of BCB Resolution No. 293 is to ensure that the institutions adhere to the rules of operation of the ecosystem, as well as to enable the proper identification of the agents and users involved, to prevent crimes related to money laundering and terrorist financing.
The new rules affect the companies that offer Pix, not the users directly. Companies will have until the end of May to adapt to the new model.
Lawyer Thiago Barbosa Wanderley, partner at Ogawa, Lazzerotti e Baraldi Advogados, stressed that the regulation seeks to standardize the performance of market players that offer the Pix service to their clients, as well as to allow third-party companies to comply with BC standards.
By Audy Castaneda
