Digital health platform Altibbi to launch new services in Saudi Arabia and Egypt

Singapore has approved a law tightening rules for crypto providers.

As per the legislation, only those service providers operating overseas will be able to obtain licence to operate in the city state, Bloomberg reported. 

The additional tightening in Singapore comes on top of the financial regulator’s latest move to discourage companies in the crypto space from advertising their services to the public, underscoring the country’s cautious approach.

SEC’s oversight 

The chairman of the US’ Securities and Exchange Commission, Gary Gensler, said his agency aims to increase regulatory oversight of the $2 trillion cryptocurrency market to protect investors from fraud attacks.

The SEC plans to register and regulate crypto platforms, including working to separate the custody of assets to reduce risk, Gensler said. 

“These crypto platforms play roles similar to those of traditional regulated exchanges,” Gensler said, at the Penn Law Capital Markets Association’s annual conference. 

“Thus, investors should be protected in the same way.”

Last year, more than $14 billion in crypto assets were stolen through fraud and cyberattacks.

The SEC will partner with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to address platforms that trade both crypto-based security tokens and commodity tokens, as it currently only oversees those that trade securities, Gensler added. 

He said the SEC will look into whether crypto platforms should be treated by his agency more like retail exchanges.

Stablecoins are also often owned by crypto platforms, creating potential “conflicts of interest and market integrity questions that would benefit from more oversight,” Gensler added.

Daily trading

Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency internationally, traded higher on Tuesday, rising by 1.44 percent to $46,662 at 2:03 p.m. Riyadh time.

Ether, the second most traded cryptocurrency, was priced at $3,518, up by 1.73 percent, according to data from CoinDesk.