Uruguay Activated? Virtual Assets Law Approved

Written by Dr. Daniel Mosco, Bergstein Abogados

Uruguay has its own crypto law. On September 27, the first law that Uruguay expressly dedicates to the topic (the “Law”) was published. The Law has already entered into force.

As is known, until now the operations of agents working with virtual assets – including cryptocurrencies – lacked express legal regulation. This circumstance, while creating a wide space for interested parties, did not fail to generate hesitation in certain sectors.

The Law assigns the Central Bank of Uruguay (the “BCU”) the responsibility of regulating a figure that the Law itself creates, namely, Virtual Asset Service Providers or VASPs (for its acronym in English). Although the Law does not define them, the Law does incorporate VASPs into the spectrum of entities subject to the control of the former, that is, “virtual asset service providers among which are those that are defined as financial by the central bank regulation .” In Creole: for the purposes of the Uruguayan system, VASPs are those entities that the BCU defines as such.

To begin activities in Uruguay, VASPs must obtain prior authorization from the BCU.

Finally, the Law establishes that entities issuing publicly offered securities are authorized (with prior approval by the BCU) to issue decentralized registered book-entry securities, that is, securities represented by book entries, which are issued, stored, transferred and negotiated electronically through distributed registry technologies that comply with the requirements established in the regulations determined by the BCU.

As can be seen, the Law is brief and will require extensive regulation by the BCU. The BCU has already reported that it expects to issue such regulations during the first half of 2025.

For any questions regarding this material, please contact Dr. Daniel Mosco ( dmosco@bergsteinlaw.com ).