According to all recent statistics, Brazil is one of the most crypto-friendly countries in the world, and now Brazilian parliament is discussing a way to regulate Bitcoin.
Brazil, a crypto friendly country
The latest report by Global Digital ranked the country sixth in the world in terms of the number of cryptocurrency owners.
Analyses by Statista, the crypto research and analysis company in Brazil, have shown that around 40 million people use cryptocurrencies.
Despite this growing popularity, there is almost no regulation of the cryptocurrency market in Brazil.
In August, the president of the Central Bank of Brazil, Campos Neto said that the country’s legislators should look more closely at the issue, as more and more Brazilians are using cryptocurrencies as an investment tool, rather than as a means of payment.
The BCB president stated:
“We need to pay attention to this. The financial market is changing so much that everything is becoming data. We need to reshape the world of regulation”.
Brazilian Parliament is discussing how to regulate crypto
There are currently a number of financial laws under discussion in parliament that indirectly affect the world of digital currencies as well.
One of these laws, Law 75/2019, is generating a heated debate between members of parliament who are in favour of greater deregulation of the crypto market and those who warn of the risks associated with its volatility and its use for illicit activities.
In recent days, a clash is said to have flared up between MP Celso Rossomano, who said that cryptocurrencies were hampering the work of the authorities in combating illegality in Brazil.
“We do everything we can to prevent crime from expanding, but today with these cryptocurrencies, unfortunately, organised crime no longer uses financial institutions to make their transfers and transits with absurd amounts, they use cryptocurrencies, which have no legal security.”
Gilson Marques, one of the most ardent defenders of cryptocurrencies in the Brazilian congress, immediately retorted, strenuously defending Bitcoin and digital currencies, stating that digital currencies should be favoured rather than criticized for their potential anti-inflationary power.
Gilson went so far as to defend digital currency as a defence against state monetary policies, prompting a vehement protest from half the Brazilian parliament.
“Bitcoin is a protection against the state, against the government, against the artificial reduction in the value of the currency, which is paid for by the very poorest”.
Bitcoin better than the Real
The Brazilian MP voted against this measure, stating that the criminal use of it is dependent on the people and not the medium they use.
His belief is that the Real, the Brazilian currency, will devalue a lot in the coming years and that he has invested everything in gold and Bitcoin, and that soon it could become legal tender in Brazil, like in El Salvador, given its growing adoption by Brazilian citizens, as well as those of Argentina and Venezuela.
In September, Brazil’s central bank said it was already working on an in-depth study of a digital Real project, to understand the potential and possibilities of such an instrument for the economy of the great South American state, following the incredible success of Pix, its new digital payment service launched in November 2020, which already has 96 million users after just a few months.
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