Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 5
By Huseyn Valiyev – Trend:
Azerbaijan is considering proposals regarding the optimization of legal regulation in the field of e-payments, a source in the country's financial market told Trend.
According to the source, the current legislation can not yet be called optimal because there are certain gaps in it, for example, gaps associated with "e-wallets", which are not fully indicated in the law.
"Moreover, there are certain issues related to virtual money and cryptocurrencies,” the source said. “Azerbaijan’s Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FIMSA) is currently considering these issues to indicate them in the legislation."
“As for the cryptocurrencies, their status is proposed to be determined, that is, to be legalized,” the source said. “This concerns the use of both local cryptocurrency and other countries' cryptocurrencies.”
"In this aspect, their issue and the holding of the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) are also proposed to be outlined,” the source said. “As is known, ICO in many countries is comparable to securities. All this should be regulated to obtain permission, and if necessary, a license.”
Moreover, one of the important issues that is proposed to be indicated in the legislation is the simplification of opening a merchant account.
"Today, the only way for entrepreneurs engaged in e-commerce in Azerbaijan to receive money from a local bank is to acquire a merchant account to accept payment via Visa and MasterCard," the source said. “The opening of a merchant account is a long process and often small businesses can not go through this procedure at all. The opening of a merchant account may take about three months while in many countries this process requires a couple of days. Therefore, this procedure is proposed to be simplified."
“There is also another hitch in the issue related to a merchant account,” the source said. “For example, having obtained this account from a bank, it is impossible to accept payments from abroad. This requires additional guarantees, deposits, etc.”
"We understand that credit card fraud is widespread in Azerbaijan and the world,” the source said. “For example, it is possible to get a merchant account from Russia during two days, from Ukraine – a half day, while in Azerbaijan – during 2 or 3 months, which is one of the main problems. The Central Bank of Azerbaijan tried to apply a new technology in some technological platforms. But this prevents the use of tokens, which prevents the use of such payment services as Google Pay, Samsung Pay and Apple pay."
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