Clifford Chance

Welcome to this week's global fintech round-up, summarising fintech regulatory developments that have happened around the world along with our Clifford Chance fintech publications and upcoming events.

Details of these and previous developments can also be found on our Fintech Topic Guide on the Clifford Chance Financial Markets Toolkit.

CLIFFORD CHANCE BRIEFINGS AND MATERIALS

• (12 Mar 2024) Clifford Chance briefing – President Biden Issues Executive Order to Protect Americans' Sensitive Personal Data: What Companies That Do Business in Countries of Concern Need to Know
• (6 Mar 2024) Clifford Chance/Tapestry Networks report – AI Connect Viewpoints: Assessing the State of Artificial Intelligence

GLOBAL LEGAL AND REGULATORY UPDATES, INDUSTRY GUIDANCE AND PUBLICATIONS

International

• (6 Mar 2024) The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub Hong Kong centre has launched the second phase of Project Aurum, in collaboration with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA). After testing the feasibility of a technological stack that integrates a wholesale interbank system and a retail e-wallet in its first phase, Project Aurum 2.0 will now focus on how to enhance privacy for retail central bank digital currencies (CBDC). | Project webpage

Americas

US:  

• (12 Mar 2024) Joint US Copyright Office - US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) report on the intellectual property (IP) law and policy implications of non-fungible tokens (NFTs), which concludes that existing statutory enforcement mechanisms are currently sufficient to address infringement concerns related to NFT applications and that changes to IP laws, or to the Offices’ registration and recordation practices, are not necessary or advisable at this time. | Press release
• (7 Mar 2024) The Chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Jerome H. Powell, has given evidence to the United States Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, stating, amongst other things, that the Fed is "nowhere near" recommending or adopting a central bank digital currency in any form | Video recording of hearing

APAC

Hong Kong:

• (12 Mar 2024) The HKMA has launched a stablecoin issuer sandbox arrangement, to tie in with its December 2023 consultation on the legislative proposal for implementing the regulatory regime for stablecoin issuers | Press release
• (7 Mar 2024) The HKMA has announced the launch of Project Ensemble, a new wholesale central bank digital currency (wCBDC) project to support the development of the tokenisation market in Hong Kong. | Press release

Europe

EU:

• (8 Mar 2024) European Banking Authority (EBA) consultation on draft guidelines for the plans to orderly redeem asset-referenced tokens (ARTs) or e-money tokens (EMTs) in the event that the issuer fails to fulfil its obligations under the Markets in Cryptoassets Regulation (MiCA). Deadline for responses: 10 June 2024 | Press release

UK:

• (11 Mar 2024) The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has announced that it will not object to requests from recognised investment exchanges to create a UK listed market segment for cryptoasset-backed exchange traded notes (CETNs). These products would only be available for professional investors, such as investment firms and credit institutions authorised or regulated to operate in financial markets.
• (8 Mar 2024) FCA report on the use of synthetic data in the financial services sector | Webpage
• (7 Mar 2024) Speech by Bank of England Executive Director for Data and Analytics Transformation and Chief Data Officer James Benford on the steps underway to update the Bank's data and analytics strategy
• (7 Mar 2024) UK Finance blog post entitled 'Getting your approach to AI right: Business Advice for Financial Services Organisations'

Middle East

Israel:

• (11 Mar 2024) Bank of Israel paper on a 'Logical Architecture for the Digital Shekel System', which discusses the various architectures for operationalising a two-tier model for the design and issuance of a retail digital central bank currency (rCBDC)