Italy Considers Harsher Penalties for Crypto Crimes

Reportedly, Italy is considering raising penalties for cryptocurrency offenses to stop market manipulation. Citing a draft order, Reuters reports that the Italian government is considering harsher sanctions for those manipulating the cryptocurrency market.

The proposed law would levy sanctions for acts including insider trading, unlawful publication of insider information, and market manipulation, ranging from €5,000 to €5 million ($5,400 to $5.4 million), if enacted. The Bank of Italy and market regulator Consob are named the main authorities monitoring cryptocurrency-related operations in the regulation. Their job is to keep the markets operating in an orderly manner and to preserve financial stability.

Regulatory Framework and Stablecoins

In early 2023, the Bank of Italy stressed the need for a robust, risk-based regulatory framework for stablecoins. The goal is to prevent a destabilizing “run” on these digital assets. Due to their close ties with decentralized finance, the financial regulator emphasized regulatory attention towards stablecoin issuers.

Subsequently, Italy’s central bank announced the creation of a supervisory environment in preparation for the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA), the EU’s forthcoming regulatory standards for the crypto industry. However, the full implementation of this supervisory framework remains unclear. At that time, Ignazio Visco, then-governor of the Bank of Italy, noted that only about 2% of Italian households held “modest amounts, on average” of crypto. He also mentioned that the exposure of Italian financial intermediaries to the crypto market was very limited.