Major EU Country Faces Crypto Regulation Roadblock

Poland’s parliament has failed to override President Karol Nawrocki’s veto of a critical cryptocurrency regulation bill, according to local media reports. 

The veto will likely negatively affect the digital asset market of the key European Union member due to prolonged regulatory uncertainty. 

The parliamentary deadlock

The Sejm (the lower house of the Polish parliament) failed to secure the three-fifths qualified majority required to overturn a presidential veto during the pivotal vote. 

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Only 243 lawmakers voted in favor of overriding the veto. It is worth noting that 276 votes are required to bypass the president’s desk. 

President Nawrocki previously vetoed a nearly identical version of the bill earlier this year.

The MiCA mandate  

The legislation was meant to ensure that the Polish national law is in synch with the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation.

If passed, the bill would have granted sweeping new powers to the Polish Financial Supervision Authority (KNF). 

The regulatory body would have obtained the legal tools to police the digital asset sector. It would have had the ability to halt public offerings of specific crypto assets, suspend trading activities, or even impose an outright ban. 

Proponents of the bill argued that there was a desperate need for these measures to improve the market. 

The pushback 

President Nawrocki defended his veto by arguing that the revised bill presented to him was virtually unchanged from the version he rejected. There was only an insignificant adjustment to the maximum cap for regulatory supervision fees.

“One detail was changed, but the fundamental errors were not removed,” the president stated, maintaining his stance that the proposed regulations are excessive, disproportionate, and place an undue burden on the industry.