RALEIGH, N.C.—The North Carolina Senate Finance Committee met last week to consider a proposed bill that would, among other things, clarify the state’s regulation of virtual currency and distributed ledger-related businesses.
As part of the Committee Meeting, the Chamber of Digital Commerce, IBM and law firm Perkins Coie presented on blockchain technology. The North Carolina Money Transmitter Act would update the state’s existing Act in a number of important ways, including the addition of a defined “virtual currency” term, and clarification as to which activity using virtual currency triggers licensure under the Act, Mondovisione.com reported.
“While current North Carolina law can clearly be read to cover certain virtual currency-related business models, its language remains ambiguous – particularly for companies using the underlying technology for applications other than payments. The Act would not only clarify the licensure requirement as to a variety of virtual currency-related business models, but it would also make important distinctions between companies using virtual currency (like bitcoin), and ones that use the underlying software technology (like blockchains or distributed ledgers),” Mondovisione.com stated.
The website said the Act provides clarity to the entire industry by defining what types of companies innovating with blockchain technology need to be licensed and regulated as money transmitters. It also updates the law to include an important agent of the payee exception, which would be available to all potentially regulated entities, whether the business model is virtual currency-related or not.
“The Act is a more comprehensive and business-friendly approach to regulating virtual currency on the state level, and starkly contrasts New York’s separate licensing regime,” Mondovisione.com noted.