論證券型虛擬通貨引進後證券法規應用與監理機制調適

Discussions on the Security Token under Taiwan's Securities Regulation and Compliance with Securities Supervision

現今資本市場處於金融科技時代的浪潮中，利用區塊鏈技術創造出虛擬通貨已成為資本市場創新募資的嶄新趨勢，而虛擬通貨之種類，中央銀行約略可區分為支付型、效用型及資產型，惟仍須視其所表彰的經濟功能以及發行目的始能進一步精確區分類型。於2019年7月主管機關有一函釋說明，有鑑於哪些虛擬通貨將歸納為主管機關所規範之證券型虛擬通貨，仍須視個案情況做判斷，此時主管機關審查標準實不宜莫衷一是。本文將重新思考現有證券法制下所定義的有價證券範圍與證券型虛擬通貨的應用交疊領域所產生的疑問，並以比較研究法分析美國證券主管機關最新STO認定標準與批准落地應用的啟發。明確的法規政策將能引導資本市場更加活絡，而發行者可遵循法規，始能確保交易市場機制正常運作，主管機關得以進行有效的監督機制，並且提供投資人正確資訊以利判斷，促使經濟發展更達效率最大化。

Cryptocurrencies can be categorized as payment tokens, utility tokens and asset tokens. Utility tokens and asset tokens can be new tools to raise funds such as Initial Coin Offering (ICO) and Security Token Offering (STO), but whether such tokens will be deemed as securities and be regulated by Securities Act can be a question. In July 2019, Taiwan Financial Supervisory Commission, pursuant to Article 6 of Securities and Exchange Act, promulgated a ruling under which securities tokens with characteristics of liquidity and investment shall be securities. The ruling is based on so-called Howey Test to examine whether a given token shall be investment contract and concludes that only debt tokens and profit-sharing tokens meet the criteria. However, such method to identify whether a token shall be security deserves a further analysis. In the meantime, other types of tokens are not securities, but they can be commodity and service traded in the market, and how to effectively regulate such types of tokens could be challenging for the competent authority. This proposal is expected to conduct a comparative research and to propose suggestions for our future policy reform by studying regulations of the United States.