Managing partner of Lawitt Hamilton Tax&Legal Angelina Fitoz gave an interview and answered questions before the event that will be held on November 23, 2024 in Armenia

Angelina, you have been in the field of international legal consulting for 20 years, and for 12 of those years you have been the owner of your own law firm. Please tell us what, from your point of view, it means to be a leader?

- You know, I have gone through several stages of understanding leadership and, most likely, I am still on the way to understanding. To be a leader means to be free. Free from your own prejudices, from fears, from the past, from failures and even free from courses where they will tell you how to become a leader. Now there is too much external content, it is very distracting from the rhythm of the heart, from the voice of conscience, from the love for the work you are doing. If you remove the dependence on external influences, while remaining an absolute participant in all processes, this is the freedom that gives the right movement to the leader.

You have known your partners with whom you are currently in the same business for a total of more than 15 years, you have worked together and separately at different times, you have been at the helm of Lawitt Hamilton Group for 7 years now, do you think this is due to a strong friendship?

- I believe that strong friendship in our time is too small and somehow too binding a term to derive the necessary formula for why people are together. People who stay together despite all the disagreements, difficult periods, ups and downs, are simply "your people". There are "your people" and there are "not yours". And this is much more and more dynamic in perception than "friendship". We all got together not only to make money or develop a brand, we are together because we all need each other for the development of each of us first of all, and only then a business or a company. Also, in personal relationships, people are together, even if they are not under the same roof, for exactly the same reason.

Since you started talking about personal matters, how do you think professional life differs from personal life, not in terms of content, but in terms of approach?

- You know, absolutely nothing. Both in our personal and professional lives, we are driven by love. It is bad if the picture is too static – this is the path to degradation. There should always be movement. Simple quarrels with loved ones are always the path of love, because this is the engine for development, just like falls in professional life. It is very important to live with an open heart and no matter what happens, continue to love – life, yourself, work, loved ones.

Angelina, you are planning to hold a business event of your company in Armenia. Besides the fact that Armenia is your historical homeland, what else does this country mean to you?

- Yes, on November 23 we will hold a business event in Yerevan. For me, Armenia is still a very difficult country to perceive, on the one hand, and a country that loves me very much, on the other hand. I do not know how to love a country as a set of buildings or mountains or nature. Unfortunately, nothing connects me with Armenia in terms of childhood memories. At the same time, Armenia, with the people I have met along the way, is doing everything very hard and with great love to turn on my genetic memory, that very “call of blood”, love. It is not me conquering Armenia, but Armenia is trying to conquer me exclusively with its love and the people along my way. I am holding an event in Armenia because I have reliable partners and because this is a movement and a step that I can take as an international lawyer, which I can take with benefit and gratitude in response to love.

Why did you choose this particular brunch theme? What prospects do you see for Armenia in this direction?

- Both the theme and location of the business brunch were not chosen by chance. Armenia is currently a crypto-friendly country with crypto exchangers and crypto ATMs. I think interesting regulations will soon appear and the country is generally open to new ideas and innovations. Our event itself is aimed at removing the veil of a gray zone and a gray topic from crypto. We will tell you about all the legal opportunities for working with crypto - from buying a yacht to obtaining a residence permit.

What experience do you have in this area?

- I created a company with a flagship practice of working with high-risk businesses and fintech businesses. The initial experience was laid down during my work at Alpari, where I ran the legal block as a member of the supervisory board of the entire group of companies. Already in our legal business, we later dealt with various legal projects with clients and businesses from the forex sphere: from obtaining forex licenses in various countries of the world to removing red flags from client companies from the World Check database, fighting scammers. Crypto clients came a little later. And here we did absolutely everything: from creating crypto exchanges to developing a corporate and legal structure for crypto lending. In 2018, Kommersant included us in the rating of “Best Industry Practices (top 5)” in the fintech sphere. Later, we regularly got into the Best Lawyers rating.

Can the average person understand crypto assets and benefit from them?

- Our business brunch brings together not only people from the industry, but also lawyers who want to become professionals in this field. We have included an educational element in our event. Absolutely anyone can figure it out, if only there is a desire.

How do you deal with the risks and uncertainty that are inherent in the crypto industry?

- Volatility of any currency: both fiat and crypto set the trend of risk and, as you say, uncertainty. In fact, everything is crystal clear - this is a high-risk industry in any case. But most of our clients are crypto brokers or owners of crypto exchanges. And we understand that brokers do not earn on market trends and risks, but on any transactions that are related to this.

How do you assess the current state of the crypto asset market, and what changes do you expect in the coming years?

- I can only assess this as a lawyer. Crypto business, like forex business, is becoming more regulated, for example, we can talk about the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) – a regulation that establishes uniform EU market rules for crypto assets. It covers crypto assets that are currently not regulated by existing financial services legislation. The key provisions for those issuing and trading crypto assets (including asset link tokens and e-money tokens) cover transparency, disclosure, authorization and transaction supervision.
On the one hand, the new legal framework will support market integrity and financial stability by regulating public offerings of crypto assets and ensuring that consumers are better informed about the risks associated with them, on the other hand, it will facilitate a higher level of market penetration by the Regulator. Time will help to assess whether this is good or bad, since the directive is currently in the implementation phase, so our goal is to increase the awareness of Clients about possible options and risks.

What would you like participants to take away from this event and apply it in their practice?

-The most important thing that each participant will take away is that cryptocurrency is a legal means of payment today. We will tell you about legal technologies for using crypto to achieve ordinary life goals.

Angelina, in conclusion, please tell us about your interests and hobbies.

- My love for dance as an art is endless. I was a professional dancer and performed on the professional stage. Unfortunately, I am no longer doing it professionally. My favorite hobby is everything related to the Home, Agriculture and Gardening in such an archaic sense. I adore the process of creating a home, a hearth, I love growing berries, vegetables and fruits not in the classical sense of a garden and vegetable garden, but everything related to growing in clay pots. Well, and an unfulfilled dream is to create a pottery workshop in the house, where I would be happy to create collections of clay pots. There is another thing I am passionate about, but it is not a hobby, it is a part of me - I am writing a book, I hope that soon I will be able to tell more details, but for now it is all a secret.