Switzerland’s FINMA Eyes Crypto Valley

Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority, FINMA, is invited by the Crypto Valley Association to regulate the country’s booming cryptocurrency industry.

Of twenty-six Swiss cantons, or member states making up Switzerland’s confederation, Zug earned worldwide notoriety for its embracing of cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin.

Indeed, with a population the size of a poorly attended American baseball game, Zug punches far above its relative weight in terms of technological enthusiasm. By summer of last year, the city itself even accepted bitcoin for some payments.

Cryptocurrencies are so part of the culture of Zug, it has come to be known colloquially as Crypto Valley, a play on tech movers and shakers in Silicon Valley, for example.

And Crypto Valley’s status has been seemingly sealed with Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) booming in value tenfold in about as many months this year, closing-in on 200 billion USD by year’s end.