The news is of those that have an epochal importance, also because it is intertwined with numerous other themes, so we try to go with order; two days ago, the Handelsblatt site (one of the leading German economic and financial news newspapers with a circulation of 150,000 copies) published an article informing that in Germany the approval process for a new bill that will allow banks to sell and hold on behalf of their customers bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies. The bill has already passed to the federal parliament and is awaiting approval from the Landers for final ratification; the first draft of the law included a "separation clause" that prevented banks from operating this kind, with the new draft, instead, banks will no longer need to create new business branches or branches dedicated exclusively to managing digital assets. While the banks were enthusiastic about this new proposal, with Sven Hildebrandt, head of the DLC consulting firm, who stated that:

Germany is on its way to becoming a crypto-paradise. The German legislator is playing a pioneering role in the regulation of cryptographic assets 

Consumer protection associations are on a war footing, fearing that banks are about to aggressively target customer savings; Indeed, Niels Nauhauser (financial expert of the consumer protection associations of Baden-Württemberg) has argued that this new bill would allow banks to circumvent the information obligations so far envisaged to sell these types of products to customers. Until now, in fact, banks could only operate on derivative products linked to cryptocurrencies, consequently they had a whole series of regulatory obligations which required communicating in a transparent manner the risks related to the use of this kind of instrument, now, however, given that the banks would directly sell cryptographic (non-derivative) currencies and then, probably, they would even pay to keep them in custody not only the communication of risks to customers but the banks will be incentivized to sell these products aggressively. As we all know, the German banking world is going through a deep crisis and this new bill probably has the aim of favoring an increase in profits for the banks, precisely through the sale and custody of cryptocurrencies, which could generate important commissions to restore stability to credit institutions but inevitably ending up relieving the risks associated with volatility on the shoulders of customers, according to consumer protection associations. The bill, in conclusion, is based on a new definition of what cryptocurrencies are, following in my opinion the regulatory framework established in Japan; if the Japanese, in fact, had created the definition of "cryptographic assets" the Germans moved along the same lines by introducing the concept of "cryptographic values", which previously did not exist in the German regulatory framework. The law defines the new cryptographic values ​​as "digital representations of a value that has not been issued by any central bank or public agency, but is accepted as a means of exchange and payment or for investment purposes".