One of the biggest impacts of emerging technology in recent years have been the currencies used as investment instruments and the transformation experienced in the transfers of these currencies. In particular, the high cost and insufficient speed of transactions carried out by traditional and centralised financial institutions have accelerated the digitalisation process of financial transactions over time and led to the formation of blockchain-based crypto asset systems, which are considered to be a revolution today.
The most significant reflection of the blockchain technology, which was first introduced in 2008 and has made its name known to the whole world in recent years, is cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin. This is because the transactions to be made with cryptocurrencies and the platforms where these transactions are carried out do not require any intermediary or are not controlled by any central authority, unlike the structure in traditional financial payment systems. Thus, since the transfers of cryptocurrencies are carried out rapidly, regardless of any geographical borders and at lower costs, these assets and platforms have become very attractive worldwide as both investment and payment instruments over time.
Nevertheless, it should not be ignored that blockchain technology and cryptocurrency assets bear various risks in themselves. In particular, despite the decentralised nature of these assets, the lack of an adequate level of regulation and supervision mechanism until the recent past has created significant grievances for investors and users of these assets as a result of illegal activities. As a matter of fact, the fraud committed by one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency trading platforms in 2022 by the CEO of a US-based company has turned out to be the most important concrete example of this risk. As a result of the illegal incidents on this platform, which has a trading volume of several hundred billion dollars, the company declared bankruptcy and as a result, investors who made transactions through the platform suffered huge financial losses.
Apart from the illegal activities that may be experienced due to the technological characteristics of crypto assets, the fact that the place where these assets are traded in today’s world is an exclusive stock exchange seems to be another risk factor for investors. Unlike inflationary factors in traditional investment and stock exchange instruments, crypto assets, whose pecuniary value is shaped according to the supply-demand balance, carry the risk of rapid increase and decrease in their pecuniary value in parallel with the sudden change of this balance. In this context, if a crypto asset, having an intense interest and tendency in a certain period of time, experiences a lack of demand in the following periods, the value of this crypto asset may decrease suddenly, and therefore, due to the sudden loss of value, investors may have difficulty in carrying out their financial transactions through the relevant assets.
Recently, it is seen that some steps have started to be taken both in the world and in Türkiye, especially in terms of crypto assets and financial transactions to be carried out in relation to these assets. In this respect, especially the Markets in Crypto Assets Regulation (“MiCA”), which entered into force in June 2023 by the European Union and started to be implemented as a whole as of December 2024, stipulates the rules regarding transparency, supervision, fraud and prevention of money laundering crimes.
In Türkiye, the first effort regarding the risks of crypto assets was the Regulation Prohibiting Payments With Crypto Assets (“Regulation”) published in the Official Gazette on 16 April 2021. The Regulation prohibits the direct or indirect use of crypto-assets in payment transactions and also prohibits payment service providers from offering intermediation services or developing business models based on crypto-assets.
Similar to MiCA, the most important regulation made in Türkiye for the supervision of crypto asset platforms and the protection of investors trading on these platforms was the Law No. 7518 on Amendment to the Capital Markets Law (“Law”), which entered into force on 02.07.2024. With the Law, the establishment and operation of crypto asset platforms were subject to the supervision of the Capital Markets Board, various sanctions were regulated for persons who violate this Law, and various provisions regarding the protection of investors’ assets were stipulated. In this way, it is aimed to protect users and investors by establishing the necessary transparency and audit mechanisms.
