Nexo sues Cayman Islands monetary regulator over VASP license

The identical week that Bulgarian authorities have been raiding Nexo’s workplaces and indicting 4 people for expenses associated to cash laundering, the crypto lender filed go well with within the Cayman Islands.

In a doc dated Jan. 12, Nexo filed a lawsuit towards the Cayman Islands Financial Authority, or CIMA, for denying its registration as a digital asset service supplier (VASP) within the island nation. The crypto lender requested the court docket to overturn the monetary regulator’s determination because it was “appropriate” to supply crypto providers to Cayman Islands residents.

In line with court docket paperwork, Nexo utilized to CIMA in January 2021, offering extra info on the request of the regulator. Nevertheless, the financial authority requested for clarification on the appliance final October, citing “sure authorized and regulatory issues as famous within the information media” that Nexo had not disclosed. It rejected the appliance in December.

“The Authority breached its constitutional and statutory obligation to supply understandable, passable and sufficiently detailed causes for its Refusal Choice,” alleged Nexo.

Associated: Nexo investigation will not be political, Bulgarian prosecutors say

Nexo claimed that CIMA had positioned “an excessive amount of weight” on regulators posing enforcement actions on the crypto lender, citing incidents in United Kingdom courts. State-level regulators in the USA additionally filed stop and desist orders towards Nexo in 2022, however Nexo says in its lawsuit that this doesn’t imply it acted improperly:

“[Nexo] had diligently cooperated with all US states and federal regulatory inquiries and has been proactive in sustaining dialogue with the respective regulators […] There have been some regulatory ambiguities with respect to the legal guidelines and laws relevant to digital property within the US such that the actual fact of the regulatory enforcement itself doesn’t connote any improper behaviour.”

The lending agency introduced in December that it deliberate to steadily stop operations in the USA “over the approaching months,” citing a scarcity of regulatory readability.