모건스탠리가 몰타 공화국이 세계에서 강상화폐 거래량이 가장 많은 것으로 조사됐다고 발표했다.
세계 가상화폐 거래소가 가장 많은 나라는 영국이다. 하지만 영국의 거래량은 전세계 거래량의 1%정도를 차지하는 정도다.
반면 거래소 순위로 보면 22위와 24위인 몰타와 벨리즈가 거래량 1, 2위를 달리고 있다. 한국은 세이셸, 미국에 이어 거래량 5위를 차지하고 있다.
몰타의 거래량이 많은 이유는 대형 거래소가 이곳에 있기 때문이다. 세계 최대 가상화폐 거래소 바이낸스가 지난 3월 홍콩에서 몰타로 이전했다. 바이낸스의 이전이 몰타의 거래량에 크게 영향을 미쳤을 것이라는 분석이다.
그렇다면 바이낸스는 왜 몰타를 선택했을까? 이는 몰타의 잘 정리된 가상화폐 관련 규제 때문이다. 규제가 없는 것보다, 잘 정리된 규제가 오히려 미래를 예측하고 계획을 세울 수 있기 때문에 매력적인 조건이라는 설명이다.
Morgan Stanley Research: Defined Regulations Main Factor For Crypto Exchanges When Choosing Country
Thanks to its well-defined regulatory framework, Malta now accounts for the largest share of cryptocurrency trading volume in the world. This conclusion comes from a Business Insider report Sunday, Apr 29, that cites a recent research done by the Morgan Stanley bank.
The top five countries by crypto trade volume are, in order, Malta, Belize, Seychelles, the US and South Korea, whereas the countries that are home to the largest number of exchanges are the UK, Hong Kong, USA, Singapore and Turkey.
One of the study’s primary discoveries was a discrepancy evident in the data from Malta and Belize - the two countries are the first and second in the world by trade volume but only 22nd and 24th by the number of registered companies respectively.
According to the researchers, this seeming contradiction is explained by the fact that these relatively small countries actually host the two largest exchanges by trading volume. Binance moved from Hong Kong to Malta after promising to do so in March of this year and OKEx, currently the second biggest exchange as per Coinmarketcap data, is officially registered in Belize. Shah commented:
Among other notable finds made by Morgan Stanley’s team is the fact that the United Kingdom, despite being the country that currently hosts the largest number of exchanges, only accounts for one percent of the global trading volume.
Overall, Shah concluded that the favorableness of local crypto business regulations is one of the main factors taken into account by crypto exchanges when deciding what country to register in. She added that in order to be attractive, a particular regulatory framework doesn’t necessarily have to be lenient but rather well-defined, because that means that the exchanges “know what to expect” and can “plan for the future.”
