# Australia Accelerates Transition to Strict Regulatory Framework for Digital Assets
In a historic move presented as a response to the tragic lessons from the collapse of FTX, the Australian government took a decisive step in late 2025. The Senate Economics Committee supported the Corporations Amendment (Digital Assets Framework) Bill 2025, ambitious legislation that now brings crypto platforms within the traditional financial licensing regime. This regulatory evolution, championed by Minister Daniel Mulino, promises to radically transform the digital assets landscape across the Oceanian continent. However, behind the laudable objective of investor protection lie legitimate industry concerns: overly broad terminology, de-banking risks, and enforcement challenges for smaller market participants.
Presented in November 2025 by Minister for Financial Services Daniel Mulino, the Corporations Amendment (Digital Assets Framework) Bill 2025 represents Canberra’s most ambitious attempt to regulate the crypto-asset universe. The legislation explicitly aims to close the gaps exposed by the resounding collapse of FTX in 2022, which left thousands of Australian investors without recourse.
At the heart of this reform lies the classification of digital tokens as financial products under the Corporations Act. This major legal qualification means that digital asset providers, known by the English acronym DAPs (Digital Asset Platforms), as well as crypto-product traders (TCPs), must now comply with the same obligations as traditional financial institutions.
ASIC, Australia’s market regulator, would see its powers significantly strengthened. The proposed framework incorporates enhanced custody standards to protect client assets, retail-specific disclosure requirements, and governance obligations analogous to those imposed on listed companies. This assimilation to the AFSL (Australian Financial Services Licence) licensing regime marks a profound break with the previous approach, which left crypto platforms in a legal grey area.
A notable provision nevertheless provides an exemption for small providers whose annual turnover remains below AUD 10 million. This carve-out aims to preserve some agility for startups and local initiatives, avoiding the stifling of emerging innovation under an overly burdensome regulatory framework.
The implementation of this regulatory framework would entail considerable operational changes for all industry participants. Platforms seeking to operate legally in Australia would need to obtain an AFSL, a demanding process requiring demonstration of sufficient financial resources, robust risk management systems, and enhanced compliance mechanisms.
The custody standards imposed by ASIC constitute one of the most demanding aspects of the new framework. Platforms would be required to segregate client assets from their own resources, with cold storage requirements for a significant portion of funds. Regular audits and transparency reports would become mandatory, enabling regulators to verify platform solvency in real time.
The disclosure rules would require platforms to provide clear and comprehensible information to retail investors. This includes publishing explanatory documents on the risks associated with crypto-assets, regular updates on the platform’s financial position, and appropriate warnings about the inherent volatility of the market.
The governance requirements would see the introduction of boards of directors with verifiable expertise, conflict of interest management policies, and accessible complaints procedures for clients. The stated objective is to professionalise a sector often criticised for its lack of organisational maturity.
The announcement of this reform elicited mixed reactions within the Australian crypto ecosystem. Ripple, one of the sector’s major players, chose to adopt a proactive engagement strategy. In April 2026, the company announced the acquisition of BC Payments Australia, thereby obtaining an AFSL. This strategic maneuver demonstrates the cross-border payments giant’s willingness to consolidate its presence in the Australian market while fully complying with the new regulatory framework.
Coinbase Australia adopted a nuanced position. The platform welcomed the Australian government’s efforts at legal clarification, acknowledging that a stable regulatory framework could ultimately reassure institutional investors and facilitate mass adoption of crypto-assets. However, the New York exchange sounded the alarm on the issue of de-banking, the phenomenon whereby traditional banks refuse or restrict access to their services for crypto sector businesses.
This concern resonates particularly in the Australian context. Four major banks in the country — Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, ANZ, and National Australia Bank — have themselves implemented more or less severe restrictions against crypto platforms and their clients. These measures, presented as safeguards against fraud and money laundering risks, effectively create a hostile environment for the industry.
From specialised law firms, criticism has focused primarily on the terminology used in the legislation. Piper Alderman, a leading firm in the fintech field, expressed concerns about the breadth of the proposed definitions. According to the lawyers, terms such as digital asset or crypto-asset could encompass very diverse product categories, creating legal uncertainty for sector participants. MPC (Multi-Party Computation) wallets also raise complex questions: can these decentralised storage solutions truly be equated with traditional financial service providers?
The de-banking phenomenon probably represents the most pressing challenge for the Australian crypto industry, beyond the regulatory questions themselves. The four major banks in the country have progressively hardened their policies towards sector businesses, sometimes going so far as to close accounts without notice or detailed explanation.
This situation creates an absurd paradox: even with a valid ASIC licence, a crypto platform could theoretically find itself unable to open a business bank account, rendering any economic activity impossible. Industry participants denounce what they consider systemic discrimination that violates the principle of equality before the law.
Commonwealth Bank, Australia’s largest bank, justified these restrictions by the elevated risks of fraud and financial crime associated with crypto-assets. Westpac and ANZ adopted similar approaches, citing the need to protect their clients and comply with anti-money laundering obligations.
For platforms like Coinbase, this reality of the Australian market partially compromises the expected benefits of the new regulation. What is the point of obtaining a licence if access to fundamental banking services remains blocked? This crucial question remained unanswered at the end of 2025, as ASIC deferred its final decisions on implementation modalities until 30 June 2026.
The regulatory path remains fraught with obstacles for Australia. The deferral of the ASIC decision until 30 June 2026 illustrates the technical and political complexity of implementing the new framework. The coming months will be decisive in shaping the implementing regulations that will translate the legislator’s intentions into concrete obligations.
The Australian crypto-asset industry, whilst relatively modest compared to American or European markets, nevertheless attracts international attention. Australia’s positioning — somewhere between European caution and the more liberal American approach — could serve as a model for other jurisdictions seeking to regulate this sector without stifling it.
The coming months will reveal whether the Australian government can strike the right balance between investor protection and innovation preservation. Ripple’s acquisition of BC Payments suggests that certain major players are willing to play the compliance game. However, without resolution of the de-banking problem, the regulation could remain a paper tiger — impressive on paper but therapeutically inapplicable.
Australia has much at stake: demonstrating that a strict regulatory framework can coexist with a flourishing ecosystem. The stakes extend beyond the Oceanian continent. The world watches how Canberra will rise to this twenty-first century challenge, at the intersection of finance, technology, and regulation.
