Digital Assets & Crypto

Digital asset and cryptocurrency businesses operate across rapidly evolving legal and regulatory frameworks. We help exchanges, wallet providers, issuers, custodians and payments businesses understand how the law applies to their activities and launch products with a clear view of regulatory risk.

Our team combines New Zealand regulatory expertise with international in-house experience across digital assets, derivatives, payments and financial services. We understand both the legal frameworks, and the products, technology and market structures they apply to. This allows us to work closely with legal, compliance, product, engineering and commercial teams, translating regulatory requirements into practical product decisions.

We support clients from market entry and initial structuring through to launch and ongoing operation, including through embedded virtual secondments.

Expertise

Licensing and registration

• We advise on whether digital asset products, services and business models trigger licensing, registration or other regulatory requirements under New Zealand law, helping clients understand the regulatory perimeter and their obligations.

Product structuring

• We work with legal, compliance, product and commercial teams to structure digital asset products, identify regulatory constraints and develop practical solutions that meet commercial objectives while managing legal risk.

Customer terms, disclosures and market conduct

• We prepare and review terms of service, trading and product documentation, disclosures, risk warnings and marketing materials, and advise on associated conduct requirements.

Regulatory strategy and engagement

• We advise on New Zealand market entry, regulatory strategy and the legal implications of launching new products or expanding existing services. We also support clients in their engagement with regulators, including in contentious matters.

Embedded support

• We can provide lawyers to work as part of a client’s team, supporting product development, regulatory matters and day-to-day legal needs. This can include coordinating local counsel and legal advice across multiple jurisdictions.

Experience

Our team combines extensive private-practice experience with first-hand in-house experience developing and supporting digital asset products.

Our experience spans spot and derivatives trading, digital asset lending, staking, self-custodial wallets, tokenised financial instruments, portfolio management, stablecoins and payments. This product knowledge enables us to identify the legal issues that matter in practice and provide commercially focused advice grounded in how digital asset businesses operate.

Our recent experience includes:

• Advising a self-custodial wallet provider on the application of New Zealand’s AML/CFT, financial service provider registration and financial markets conduct regimes to its product.

• Advising on the proposed launch of decentralised yield products for a global digital asset exchange.

• Advising a global cloud platform on a proposed product involving the use of stablecoins to facilitate transactions, and the application of New Zealand’s financial services regulatory framework.

• Advising a global digital asset exchange on the regulatory treatment of tokenised securities.

• Advising a global digital asset exchange on the structuring and regulatory treatment of digital asset lending products.