Actors in the sphere of issuing and turnover of digital financial assets: legal problems

Abstract

The new technological realities significantly affect the economic turnover, which due to digital transformation requires adequate legal regulation. Public relations complicated by digitalization need clarification of the legal status of their actors. The subject of this research is the legal status of actors in the sphere of issuing and turnover of digital financial assets. The research leans on the formal legal method for establishing the content of legal norms regulating the issuance and turnover of digital financial assets. The methods of analysis and comparison were applied for revealing the peculiarities of the legal status of the parties to relations in the sphere of issuing and turnover of digital financial assets. The novelty of this article in the fact that most sources focus on the digital financial assets as the objects of civil turnover, while there are no works dedicated to comprehensive analysis of the legal status of the actors in the sphere of issuing and turnover of digital financial assets. It is demonstrated that the key actors in the sphere of issuing and turnover of digital financial assets are the emitters or holders of digital financial assets, operators of information systems, and operators of the exchange of digital financial assets. However, the existing legal regulation does not contain an accurate mechanism for interaction between these parties. The author takes into account the complex nature of relationships between the emitters and the holders of digital financial assets, as well as the fact that digitalization affects only the external aspect of relations. As a result of analysis of the legal status of  the operators of information systems and operators of the exchange of digital financial asset, the author highlights five groups of requirements that need to be met; as well as establishes gaps in determining the responsibilities of the operator of information system.