Pilot Regime – The kick-off of the tokenization of financial instruments | Allen & Overy LLP

The Regulation is part of the measures proposed by the European Commission aimed at ensuring that the EU embraces the digital revolution in the financial sector.

As of today, 22 June 2022, the Regulation (EU) 2022/858 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2022 on a pilot regime (the Pilot Regime) for market infrastructures based on distributed ledger technology (Regulation 858) enters into force. Except for certain specific provisions, it will be applicable from 23 March 2023.

Background

Regulation 858 is part of the so-called “Digital Finance Package”, a package of measures proposed by the European Commission in September 2020 with an aim to identify a digital finance strategy ensuring that the EU embraces the digital revolution in the financial sector. One of the strategy’s identified priority areas is ensuring that the EU financial service regulatory framework is innovation-friendly and does not pose obstacles to the application of new technologies.

To allow for innovation in a way that preserves financial stability while protecting investors, the European Commission proposes a framework for crypto-assets, differentiating between those crypto-assets being already governed by the EU financial service legislation, as qualifying as “financial instruments” under MiFID II, and other crypto-assets currently unregulated. Thus, to properly address the specificities of each category of assets, the Digital Finance Package includes Regulation…