Just one week after Kenya enacted its own measure governing the cryptocurrency business, Ghana’s central bank is pushing a bill to parliament to have crypto rules in place by the end of the year.
At the meetings of the International Monetary Fund in Washington on Thursday, Johnson Asiama, the governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG), stated that the nation has “done a lot of work in the past four months to put together the regulatory environment” and draft laws.
“That bill is on its way to parliament, hopefully before the end of December, we should be able to regulate cryptocurrencies in Ghana,” he said.
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Crypto regulations in Ghana
Kenya’s virtual asset service providers (VASP) bill, which established licensing, consumer safeguards, and a framework for exchanges, brokers, wallet operators, and token issuers, was approved by the nation’s parliament on October 7 of this month.
The BoG had previously given crypto rules a September deadline. In August 2024, the bank also released draft guidelines while requesting more public input.
Asiama said, “Therefore, we are developing the expertise, we are developing the manpower. We are putting together a new department that will help us. It is an important area. We can no longer ignore it, and we’re trying very hard to be able to regulate that.”
Given that the oversight department has not yet been established, Ghana’s ambitious deadline raises concerns about its ability to implement the law.
Ghana and cryptocurrencies
According to Demandsage, an online data and analytics platform, more than 3 million Ghanaians, or around 8.9% of the 34 million people living there, utilise cryptocurrency in some capacity, even in the absence of laws.
In September, the Bank of Ghana submitted a comprehensive regulatory framework to the Parliament in order to provide licenses for cryptocurrency platforms.
The goal of the measure is to regulate wallet providers, exchanges, and other digital asset services that millions of Ghanaians rely on.
The “digital train has left the station,” according to Isaac Simpson, senior head of financial advising and equity capital markets at Stanbic Bank Ghana, who stated in July that Ghana must advance with rules or risk falling behind.
This shows how important crypto regulations have become in the world. If the government failed to recognise cryptocurrencies, then they would risk falling behind and missing out on one of the most revolutionary movements of the financial world across the globe.
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