Calculating the cost: What CASPs need to know about the Polish Draft Cryptocurrency Act

The draft Cryptocurrency Act has revealed the fees that cryptocurrency service providers (CASPs) and issuers of asset-linked tokens will be required to pay as part of the cryptocurrency market oversight framework being introduced in Poland in line with MiCA. Let's take a look at the key costs associated with market supervision:

Licensing Fees: CASPs will be required to cover licensing fees, notably a fixed fee equivalent to €4,500 for the authorisation referred to in Articles 16(1)(a) (authorisation of an asset-linked token for trading within the EU) and 59(1)(a) (authorisation of CASPs to provide crypto-asset services) of MiCA.

Assessment Fees: The assessment of planned acquisitions of asset-linked token issuers, acquisitions of significant cryptocurrency holdings, as well as the assessment of the provision of cryptocurrency services by certain financial institutions will subject to a fee of up to the equivalent of €4,500.

Documentation Fees: The cost of approving a cryptoasset information document prepared for asset-linked tokens has been set at the equivalent of €3,000. Moreover, the act mandates annual fees to sustain the supervisory framework:

Annual Contributions: CASPs will have to contribute yearly based on their average three-year revenue, without surpassing 0.05% of this average, but not falling below €750. Whereby, the draft Cryptocurrency Act lays down different rules for calculating the fee base for CASPs starting to provide services.

Asset-Linked Tokens Issuers: These entities will be subjected to an annual fixed fee of €750.

The conversion rates for these fees will anchored to the average Euro rate published by the National Bank of Poland.