Wyoming ‘financial technology sandbox’ bill seeks to boost blockchain and fintech innovation

A bill has been introduced in Wyoming’s state legislature to establish financial technology sandbox in order to boost innovation in this space.

Introduced last week, the “Financial Technology Sandbox Act” seeks to create a financial technology sandbox for the testing of financial products and services in the state of Wyoming.

The bill noted that financial technology is currently undergoing a transformational period, adding that the existing legal frameworks are outdated and restricting fintech innovation.

“Financial technology innovators require a supervised, flexible regulatory sandbox to test new products and services using waivers of specified statutes and rules under defined conditions,” it said.

“The state of Wyoming currently offers one of the best business environments in the United States for blockchain and financial technology innovators, and should offer a regulatory sandbox for these innovators to develop the next generation of financial technology products and services in Wyoming.”

If passed, the bill will create a program which will allow a person to “make an innovative financial product or service available to consumers during a sandbox period through a waiver of existing statutory and rule requirements, or portions thereof, by the commissioner or secretary.”

Importantly, the innovative product or service to be made available to consumers in the sandbox may include those products and services that utilize blockchain technology, according to the bill.

Recently, the state of Wyoming passed a bill that allows banks to provide banking services to blockchain firms, Bitcoin Magazine reported.

Earlier this month, Medici Land Governance, a blockchain subsidiary of Overstock.com focused on land administration, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Teton County, Wyoming to develop a blockchain-based land records and information platform in 2019.