MALTA Law and Practice Contributed by: Ian Gauci and Cherise Abela Grech, GTG Legal
• the provision of transfer services for crypto- assets on behalf of clients. Similar to the VFA regime, persons seeking to provide such services are required to apply for authorisation from the competent authority of their home member state before offering any such services. Please see 6.2 Regulation of Different Asset Classes regarding the legal classification of crypto-assets under MiCA. 10.4 Regulation of “Issuers” of Blockchain Assets The VFAA regulated the issuers of offers to the public of VFAs. MiCA regulates the issue of offers to the public in relation to ARTs, EMTs and crypto-assets that are not regulated as ARTs and EMTs. Offerors of ARTs must either be authorised as a credit institution or be a legal person or other undertaking that is established in the EU and has been authorised in terms of MiCA. Offerors of EMTs, on the other hand, must be either a credit institution or an electronic money institu - tion. In both cases, offerors are required to draw up a crypto-asset white paper and notify this to the competent authority of their home member state. MiCA and the applicable guidelines and regulatory standards clearly outline the specific information that needs to be included in the white paper. Issuers of other crypto-assets must be legal persons and must draw up a crypto-asset white paper in terms of MiCA. The white paper must be notified to the competent authority of their home member state at least 20 working days before publication.
An important principle under MiCA is that retail holders who purchase crypto-assets either directly from an offeror or from a CASP placing crypto-assets on behalf of that offeror have a right of withdrawal of 14 calendar days without incurring any fees or costs and without being required to give reasons. The period of with - drawal begins from the date of the agreement of the purchase of the crypto-assets. Upon exercise of withdrawal, all payments received from a retail holder including, if appli - cable, any charges are to be reimbursed without undue delay and in any event no later than 14 days from the date on which the offeror or the CASP is informed of the retail holder’s decision to withdraw. However, the right of withdrawal does not apply where the crypto-assets have been admitted to trading prior to their purchase by the retail holder. MiCA exempts various offers to the public from its requirements, including: • an offer to fewer than 150 natural or legal per - sons per member state where such persons are acting on their own account; • an offer to the public for which, over a period of 12 months starting with the beginning of the offer, the total consideration does not exceed EUR1 million or the equivalent amount in another official currency or in crypto-assets; • an offer of a crypto-asset addressed solely to qualified investors where the crypto-asset can only be held by such qualified investors; • instances where the crypto-asset is offered for free; • when the crypto-asset is automatically cre - ated as a reward for the maintenance of the
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