Okay. Hi everyone. Just one small correction. I am in the regulation only for little bit more 1 year and half. Uh the previous my job was the in the capital market Bulgarian Stock Exchange and Central Depository.
But dear guests, dear colleagues, the ladies and gentlemen, it's a pleasure for me to join this event Blockchain Week in Bulgaria for the second time. And the event is important not only because it's a bridge between it's bring together the people that are building the blockchain market world today, but it's important because it's a show how fast the line between technology finance is changing. We are no longer asking if the blockchain have a place in the finance, but we are asking more practical question, uh what will happen, what will the financial markets looks like after the blockchain became the part of the everyday systems. And this is the where the regulation it's coming. This is the exact point.
Not to stop the new ideas, but to create the right conditions for them and to grow and save the lasting the lasting way. With Mika in Europe uh Europe has done uh something grow, something new, something uh, uh, good, not only because in the two, three years ago, we can imagine that this will be happen. It has created a one common set of rules for crypto assets markets across whole Europe. What does mean that? This is a major change.
A single market is not only about the having the same rules. It mean that the businesses can grow across the Europe, whole Europe. You can have a license here, you can work in the all Europe. It mean that the investors can have the better protection. And it meet It mean that regulations can work with the common rules and standards.
In our universe, we call it that regulatory convergence. For Bulgaria, this is a very important opportunity. Our task is to build strong MiCA market. A market where the rules are clear, where the license mean a real standard of quality, where the new in days ideas can grow, and where trust is not just a message used in a marketing, but the result of good regulation. Over the past few months, Bulgaria has made important progress.
The MiCA transi- The MiCA transition period ended and as you know, ended in the 1st of July this year. From that date, providing the crypto crypto assets services in EU is regulated and require the necessary license. This is an important moment, but it is not see, it is the end of the process because the licensing the licensing is only beginning. After the licensing, that we are starting the ongoing supervision, which is also important thing. And it mean ongoing responsibility toward the clients.
It mean good risk management. It mean strong technology and safe business system. And it mean being ready to respond to new risks that as they appear. This year, Bulgaria took another important step. The Financial Supervision Commission issued the first as I remember, four uh MiCA licenses in Bulgaria.
The process clearly that it mean to be ready to do that we are ready to do the new rules. And it is not only about the documents, the license, it's about the having the real business model. Good management, strong internal controls, good risk management, strong and proper AML and CFT system, strong ICT systems, and the right people, skills, and resources. Most of all, it mean being ready to provide the services in responsible way. This is one of the most important message that I could like I would like to share with the market.
MiCA is not just administrative task. MiCA is a task of business maturity. And that is the that is the why the first license is so important. This show that the Bulgaria already has come companies that can meet these strong requirements. So, what come next?
I would focus on the four priorities. Of course, first priority is licensing. Our goal should not simply be to have more companies with licenses. Not uh more CASPs with license licensed CASPs. We need strong and stable companies.
Companies with the uh with the real skill, good management, strong control system, and business business model that can handle both growth and innovation in the difficult times. The second priority, of course, is the supervision of the licensed uh companies. MiCA give us the rules, but good supervision mean working behind that, behind the formal rules. We need to understand how business work. We need to find risk early.
We need to use data, and we need to improve the technology used by the supervisors because we cannot supervise the companies that you use it advanced technology with the old uh models uh that we have it in the the traditional one. The The third opportunity in European The third opportunity, the third priority our our is European cooperation. This is very important because the MiCA is European regulation. So, our supervision must also work in the European way. This mean close cooperation with the European regulator regulators, common standards, clear and consistent expectation, and the same approach to the same level of risk.
For businesses, this is very important. The single market should provide predictability and and predictability is one of the most valuable part of the good regulation. And the fourth, but the not the last one, priority is the trust. Because at the end, financial market is trust. Here,
[gasps]
I would like to uh to go over on one uh step further. Uh our goal should not be the Bulgaria simply to meet their Mika requirements, but we would also be ready for the new generation of financial market. The next question will not only be, "Do you have license?" But real question, real practical question is, "What are you building with that license?" We will see more tokenization, more financial products using blockchain, new ways of of supervision, new payments solution, stable coins, and more use of blockchain by banks and other large financial institutions.
We will also see closer connection between the traditional finance markets and digital assets. Bulgaria has some real advantages here. We have a strong technology sector. We have many new and growing businesses. We have financial infrastructure.
And we have access to the European single market. We also have the chance to build a regulatory environment that brings together innovation and trust. Regulation should not be the barrier for good the good business ideas, but regulation should not protect also the bad business models. And here we are coming to the one important thing, how we can manage the risk. It change the the this way also, but that that I could share with you now is that in the financial markets the risks is not only depend of the technology.
Probably the new technology are changing the some of the risks that are related to to to the technology, but financial services us services have quite similar uh risk and we have to apply the principle same risk, same regulation, same rules. So, what would I like to Bulgaria be in the next years? Not simply a country with a certain numbers of license and crypto assets providers. I would like Bulgaria to be place where regulated companies build a product with whole European market. A place where investors trust the financial system, where the financial institutions can safely use the blockchain technology, and place where the new ideas can move from the test project to the real use, and the place where the regulator it close in is close enough to the market to understand the new risks while remain independent enough to protect the public interest.
That is an equal ecosystem, and that is the kind of ecosystem we should work to build. Okay, and dear guests, so let me finish with one message. Bulgaria has already crossed the first line licensing. We work and we have a working Mika framework. We have to super We have the supervisory system in place.
We have our first licensed CASPs and we have a market that is that is learning more and more and it mean to work in a regulated environment, but real success will not be measured only by the number of licensed you licensed that you should. It will be measured measured by whether we can build a market where the innovation and trust support each other. This is our next task to move from transition to maturity, from licensing to ongoing supervision, from individual companies to ecosystem, from national market to European scale, from the simply being Mika compliant to be Mika ready for the future. It will be to build together with clear rules, with standards, high standards, with the courage to use the new technology and with trust. Thank you.
[music]
Automatic transcript — names and jargon may be misspelled.