The Austrian Financial Market Authority (FMA) today admitted four Austrian crowdfunding platform providers to the Regulatory Sandbox, who are acquiring a licence as European crowdfunding service providers, and therefore wish to provide services throughout the entire European internal market. With the three innovative crypto service providers already receiving regulatory support in the sandbox, there are now seven FinTechs using the FMA’s service. The first ever participant in the sandbox has just been able to acquire a licence as an investment firm and is therefore allowed to operate in the market with its innovative business model, a digital trading platform for transferable securities in the form of distributed ledger technology (DLT) or Blockchain-based “security tokens”. “Our Regulatory Sandbox promotes innovations in the Austrian financial centre, and therefore strengthens it as a business location,” remarked the FMA’s Executive Directors, Helmut Ettl and Eduard Müller. “Furthermore, it helps the supervisor to remain on the pulse of technological development.”
Innovative business models subject to financial market regulations can be checked in the sandbox about whether they meet the requirements set out in supervisory law and can be developed until they reach a regulatory mature state. It is available both to newly founded enterprises (start-ups) as well as financial services providers that are already supervised for investigating and developing innovative digital business models. The prerequisite for participation is that the “Regulatory Sandbox Advisory Board” housed at the Federal Ministry of Finance attests that the digital business model has an increased innovative value in the national economic interest.
In the sandbox, participants are assisted closely by FMA experts in relation to all regulatory issues. The key component of the sandbox is a test phase, during which the entity tests its business model under normal regulatory operating conditions. In this phase, all regulatory rules are required to be observed fully.
A list of all the conditions for participation in the Regulatory Sandbox, how it is organised as well as a details list of processes can be found on the FMA website under this link.