Florian Glatz: The European Crypto Initiative – Why Europe Needs a Regulatory Shift to Avoid Crypto Irrelevance

Epicenter - Learn about Crypto, Blockchain, Ethereum, Bitcoin and Distributed Technologies

Florian Glatz, blockchain.lawyer, is one of the most knowledgeable OG's at the intersection of crypto and law. He was last on the show 6 years ago when we talked in great detail about smart contracts and the DAO. We welcomed him back to discuss the regulatory environment, with a focus on Europe. We covered key topics like the recently floated Proof of Work ban, Travel of Funds Regulation (TFR), and Markets in Crypto-assets (MiCA) regulation. We also discussed the European Crypto Initiative, a new lobby organization that Florian co-founded, which is advocating for crypto-friendly regulation on a European level.

Topics covered in this episode:

• What Florian got wrong about DAOs when he was on the show in 2016
• The story of the Geman blockchain association Bundesblock that Florian co-founded and was president of
• The European Crypto Initiative - Why a European-level organization is needed
• The most important regulatory questions facing crypto today
• Why crypto taxation is a particularly challenging issue
• How will competition between different nation states play out?
• Whether we will see the rise of new nation states or digital nations

Episode links:

• Episode 125 - Defining a Legal Framework for Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAO)
• The Sovereign individual
• blockchain.lawyer
• Florian on Twitter

Sponsors:

• Chorus One: Chorus One runs validators on cutting edge Proof of Stake networks such as Cosmos, Solana, Celo, Polkadot and Oasis. - https://epicenter.rocks/chorusone
• ParaSwap: ParaSwap aggregates all major DEXs and makes sure you beat the market price at every single swap and with the lowest slippage - paraswap.io/epicenter

This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/422