The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) have issued a statement saying that ICOs may fall within the scope of securities regulation. The statement reads, “Depending on how they are structured, ICOs may fall outside of the scope of the existing rules and hence outside of the regulated space. However, where the coins or tokens qualify as financial instruments it is likely that the firms involved in ICOs conduct regulated investment activities, such as placing, dealing in or advising on financial instruments or managing or marketing collective investment schemes. Moreover, they may be involved in offering transferable securities to the public.”

Regulation of cryptocurrencies in the E.U. is evolving at the time of writing. There were very few regulations on blockchains in the E.U. in early 2018, but on April 20, 2018 the E.U. Parliament just voted that crypto exchanges had to be registered and have to comply with due-diligence procedures including customer verification in response to anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing concerns.

The Italian government is drafting new rules for the registration of cryptocurrency businesses at the time of writing (May 29, 2018), particularly with regard to anti-money laundering (AML) legislation. Be on the lookout for these rules, which should go into place before July 2018. The initial draft of these rules seems to say that any service providers in virtual currency in Italy must notify the Ministry of Economics and Finance, whereupon they will be added to a new database by the Agency for Agents and Mediators and monitored by the Financial Police and the Postal and Communications Police for compliance with AML and terrorist-financing laws. (Source).

Sources:

• ESMA alerts firms involved in Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) to the need to meet relevant regulatory requirements
• Anti-money laundering: MEPs vote to shed light on the true owners of companies
• Article: EU Parliament Votes for Closer Regulation of Cryptocurrencies
• Jan 31, 2018, Blockchain and Virtual Currency Regulation in the EU
• Inital Draft of Italian AML Laws (In Italian)