The Philippine Central Bank tightens listing rules: privacy coins are banned.
The Central Bank of the Philippines (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas) has officially approved an updated cryptocurrency listing regulation for all licensed virtual asset service providers. The key innovation is a complete ban on adding and supporting tokens aimed at enhancing transaction anonymity, so-called privacy coins.
Six Pillars of Due Diligence
Now, before listing any asset, providers are required to conduct a thorough review based on six mandatory criteria. These include: analysis of data on the issuer and project team, assessment of market maturity and trading history, real-world use cases of the token, level of code transparency and security, sufficiency of liquidity and reserves, and full compliance with current legislation.
This is not a one-time procedure. The regulator requires platforms to conduct ongoing monitoring of already listed assets. Moreover, each exchange must clearly specify in advance, at the rule approval stage, the conditions under which trading will be suspended or the asset will be completely delisted.
Expert Assessment
The Philippines continues its journey from a complete ban on cryptocurrencies to creating a strict but clear infrastructure. The ban on privacy coins is a logical step in line with the global trend of the FATF (Financial Action Task Force). However, it is worth noting that this approach could significantly limit opportunities for innovation in DeFi and privacy payments in the local market. Investors should prepare for the liquidity of privacy assets on Philippine platforms to soon drop to zero.