Australian election will bring pro-crypto laws either way
By: bitcoin ethereum news|2025/05/02 23:15:02
0
Share
Despite reports in February suggesting that 2 million pro-crypto voters could decide the outcome of this week’s Australian Federal Election, crypto has barely rated a mention during the campaign. “I think it’s a missed opportunity,” Independent Reserve founder Adrian Przelozny told Cointelegraph. “Neither side has made crypto a headline issue because they’re wary of polarizing voters or sounding too niche.” But the good news is that after more than a decade of inaction, both the ruling Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the opposition Liberal Party are promising to enact crypto regulations developed in consultation with the industry. In April, Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor promised to release draft crypto regulations within the first 100 days after taking office, while the Treasury itself has draft bills on “regulating digital asset platforms” and “payments system modernization” scheduled for release this quarter. Amy-Rose Goodey, CEO of the Digital Economy Council of Australia, said that both parties “are equally invested in getting this draft legislation across the line.” “Irrespective of who gets in, we’re in a better position than we were about a year ago.” Pro-crypto voters have choices in the Senate, too, with the Libertarian Party issuing a 23-page Bitcoin policy in March — calling for the creation of a national Bitcoin (BTC) Reserve and the acceptance of Bitcoin as legal tender. The minor party is fielding five Senate candidates in different states, including former Liberal MP Craig Kelly, but doesn’t currently have anyone in the Senate. The progressive left-wing Greens party has not outlined a position on crypto, while the conservative right-wing One Nation party has campaigned against debanking and CBDCs. More than a decade of inaction on crypto Australia’s first parliamentary inquiry into digital assets was held back in 2014, but there’s been more than a decade of regulatory inaction since. The industry says this has led to stagnation and a brain drain of talent to jurisdictions like Singapore and the UAE. The former Liberal Government was considering the landmark Digital Services Act, based on the 2021 Senate Committee’s crypto recommendations, when it lost office in 2022. Despite ongoing consultations since, the ALP government, led by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, hasn’t put forward any legislation to parliament. But there has definitely been a vibe shift from the ALP recently, with Treasurer Jim Chalmers telling Cointelegraph that digital assets “represent big opportunities for our economy.” ”We want to seize these opportunities and encourage innovation at the same time as making sure Australians can use and invest in digital assets safely and securely with appropriate regulation.” His office said exposure draft legislation would be released “in 2025” for consultation, introduced into Parliament “once that feedback has been considered” with the subsequent reforms “phased in over time to minimize disruptions to existing businesses.” The shadow assistant treasurer, Luke Howarth, said the ALP has been slow to act because it didn’t have a blockchain policy when it was elected. “It wasn’t until the FTX collapse that they acknowledged the need for regulation,” he told Cointelegraph. “The Albanese government initially promised it would put in place regulation by 2023 but have failed to draft legislation or give a clear time-frame for action. After three years, all that was offered to industry was a six-page placeholder document.” He’s referring to Treasury’s March statement “on developing an innovative Australian digital asset industry.” It provides for the licensing of Digital Asset Platforms (DAPS), a framework for payment stablecoins and a review of Australia’s Enhanced Regulatory Sandbox. Related: A guide to crypto trading bots: Analyzing strategies and performance While short on detail, those aims are broadly similar to the crypto regulation priorities that Howarth outlines to Cointelegraph — the big difference being that the opposition has committed to a faster time frame. Przelozny praised the 100-day promise as “exactly the kind of urgency we need.” If elected, the Liberal Party’s legislation is expected to take some of its cues from Senator Andrew Bragg’s private members bill in 2023 and some from the more recent work done by the Treasury. The government steps up efforts The Treasury has been quietly drafting legislation this year, which Goodey understands is “almost complete.” “There’s been prioritization within Treasury, and I know that their team has almost doubled — the digital asset team — for writing that draft legislation. So, there has been an investment in that over the past six months.” Przelozny characterizes the ALP’s approach as “cautious and methodical, but it’s been slow,” prioritizing consumer protection and risk management. BTC Markets CEO Caroline Bowler said the election of a pro-crypto Trump administration and the UK’s draft regulations (released this week) likely forced both sides of politics to finally get serious. ”Australia has ground to make up, and I would anticipate this also being a factor in the savvy move by both parties,” she said. Stand With Crypto campaign and ASIC The Stand With Crypto campaign is active in Australia but has been fairly low-key during the campaign, with a focus on debanking. Coinbase managing director for APAC John O’Loghlen called on whoever wins the election to launch a “Crypto-Asset Taskforce (CATF) within the first 100 days.” This would include industry and consumer representatives to finally get crypto regulations over the line. “If Australia doesn’t move now, we risk falling even further behind,” he told Cointelegraph. “The next government must move beyond consultation and into legislation.” The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) is the local equivalent of the US Securities Exchange Commission (SEC). It released its own crypto regulatory proposals in December. Related: Trump’s first 100 days ‘worst in history’ despite crypto promises Joy Lam, Binance’s head of global regulatory and APAC legal, told Cointelegraph she doesn’t expect ASIC to suddenly change direction if a new government comes in, as the SEC did. “ASIC doesn’t make the law,” she said. “I don’t expect a complete kind of 180 because ASIC, it is independent, and it does have its own mandate, but it obviously operates within the legislative framework that the government is going to be setting.” Who should single-issue crypto voters back? In February, a poll by YouGov and Swyftx found that 59% of crypto users would vote for a pro-crypto candidate in the federal election above all other issues. That equates to around 2 million Australians and would be enough to determine the outcome of the election one way. But the similarities between the major parties on crypto regulation are much greater than the differences. Goodey said both sides of politics have genuinely engaged with the industry about its concerns and priorities. “You can see in some of the language with their media releases that they both released in March, April this year, that they are in agreement on what the industry issues are,” she said. Owing to Senator Bragg’s campaigning on crypto, the industry sees the Liberal Party as more enthusiastic about digital assets, but after three years in government, the ALP looks to have arrived at roughly the same place. Recent YouGov and Resolve polls suggest the government is likely to be reelected. While internal Liberal polling suggests an ALP minority government is a genuine possibility, the major parties would have enough votes between them to pass bipartisan crypto legislation. Whatever happens, 2025 looks like the year Australia will finally provide the crypto industry with the certainty it needs. “For industry, the timing is really quite critical now because obviously it’s something that has been discussed and kicked around for quite a few years,” Lam said. “I would say that we are cautiously optimistic.” Magazine: ZK-proofs are bringing smart contracts to Bitcoin — BitcoinOS and Starknet Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/pro-crypto-legislation-australian-federal-election-guide?utm_source=rss_feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss_partner_inbound
You may also like

Inter-generational Prisoner's Dilemma Resolution: The Nomadic Capital and Bitcoin's Inevitable Path
When the Baby Boomer generation collectively sells off, who will be the "bag holder" in the next asset crash?

Upstream and downstream are starting to fight, all for the sake of everyone being able to "Lobster"
「Lobster」 may not be a mature product yet, but it has already ushered in a new era of 「AI Assistants」.

Circle and Mastercard Announce Partnership, the Next Stage for the Crypto Industry Belongs to Payments
Stablecoins are transitioning from a speculative tool to real financial scenarios such as payments, cross-border transfers, and store of value.

From 5 Mao per kWh of Chinese electricity to a $45 API export: Tokens are rewriting currency units
When the same unit can both measure hashing power and facilitate payments, it ceases to be just a term and begins to evolve into a new currency of both value and influence.

Why is OpenAI playing catch-up to Claude Code instead?
Anthropic Bets Earlier on AI Programming, OpenAI Strategic Tempo Misaligned

Vitalik wrote a proposal teaching you how to secretly use AI large models
Vitalik believes that in the AI era, users should not have to sacrifice their identity to use an AI tool.

The doubling of Circle's stock price and the paradigm shift of stablecoins
The initial investments from Circle and Stripe, whether it is the R&D expenses for Arc, the high financing costs associated with Tempo, or the billion-dollar acquisitions of Bridge-type assets, are more akin to "placement fees" rather than commercially recoverable investments in the short term.

Key Market Information Discrepancy on March 13th - A Must-See! | Alpha Morning Report
1. Top News: Latest Developments in US-Iran Conflict, Son of Soleimani Vows Revenge, US Navy Plans to Escort Ships in the Strait of Hormuz
2. Token Unlock: $HTM

On-Chain Options Explosion.ActionEvent
Options are becoming the new anchor in the cryptocurrency market.

《Time》 Magazine Names Anthropic as the World's Most Disruptive Company
The most AI-wary company has created the most dangerous AI

Predictions market gains mainstream traction in the US, Canada, Claude launches Chart Interaction feature, What's the English community talking about today?
What Did Foreigners Care About Most in the Last 24 Hours?

500 Million Dollars, 12 Seconds to Zero: How an Aave Transaction Fed Ethereum's "Dark Forest" Food Chain
Spend $154,000 to buy AAVE at market price of only $111

AI Agent needs Crypto, not Crypto needs AI
It is not Crypto that needs AI to survive, but rather AI Agents that need Crypto to be implemented: when AI truly shifts from "thinking" to "executing," it must seek the boundaries of authority and funding within the programmable primitives of Crypto.

Stablecoins are breaking away from cryptocurrency, becoming the next generation of infrastructure for global payments
The use of stablecoins is shifting from facilitating low-cost cross-border remittances to supporting general commercial activities and inter-company vendor payments.

Web3 teams should stop wasting marketing budgets on the X platform
The announcements from the project party are still very important, but they should no longer be the starting point of promotional activities; instead, they should be the endpoint.

Strive buys Strategy stocks, and Bitcoin treasury companies start nesting each other
When everyone's bets are placed on the same table, the difference between "structured financing" and "concentrated gambling" may just be a few more arrows drawn on the PPT.

Strive to buy Strategy stock, Bitcoin Treasury company starts nesting dolls with each other
Bitcoin hodlers are starting to nested be in each other.

Key Market Intel on March 12th, how much did you miss out on?
1. On-chain Funds: $29.7M inflow to Hyperliquid today; $30.9M outflow from Base
2. Biggest Gainers/Losers: $DRV, $LYN
3. Top News: US plans to release 172M barrels of oil to curb prices, on-chain pre-market crude oil gains narrow by 4%
Inter-generational Prisoner's Dilemma Resolution: The Nomadic Capital and Bitcoin's Inevitable Path
When the Baby Boomer generation collectively sells off, who will be the "bag holder" in the next asset crash?
Upstream and downstream are starting to fight, all for the sake of everyone being able to "Lobster"
「Lobster」 may not be a mature product yet, but it has already ushered in a new era of 「AI Assistants」.
Circle and Mastercard Announce Partnership, the Next Stage for the Crypto Industry Belongs to Payments
Stablecoins are transitioning from a speculative tool to real financial scenarios such as payments, cross-border transfers, and store of value.
From 5 Mao per kWh of Chinese electricity to a $45 API export: Tokens are rewriting currency units
When the same unit can both measure hashing power and facilitate payments, it ceases to be just a term and begins to evolve into a new currency of both value and influence.
Why is OpenAI playing catch-up to Claude Code instead?
Anthropic Bets Earlier on AI Programming, OpenAI Strategic Tempo Misaligned
Vitalik wrote a proposal teaching you how to secretly use AI large models
Vitalik believes that in the AI era, users should not have to sacrifice their identity to use an AI tool.