The European Union (EU) finally agreed on landmark anti-money laundering rules for crypto transactions Wednesday, despite industry concerns over the law harming privacy and innovation.
The final proposals will mean customer identity needs to be verified for even the smallest crypto transfers, if it’s between two regulated digital wallet providers – but payments to unhosted private wallets will largely be left out of laundering checks.
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EU lawmaker Ondřej Kovařík confirmed the provisional deal in a tweet, saying that it “strikes the right balance in mitigating risks for fighting money laundering in the crypto sector without preventing innovation and overburdening businesses.”
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Kovařík said those unhosted wallet rules would only apply when transfers were made to a person’s own private wallet, and only when the value was over 1,000 euros ($1,052). A further source briefed on talks has confirmed those details.
Ernest Urtasun, a member of the European Greens party, who jointly led parliament’s negotiations on the law, tweeted that the rules were “putting an end to the wild west of unregulated crypto, closing major loopholes in the European anti-money laundering rules.”
Urtasun confirmed that the final deal would mean that, for transactions between regulated wallets, customer identity details have to be recorded for even the smallest transaction. That makes crypto rules unlike those for the conventional banking sector, which only catch those worth over 1,000 euros.
Lawmakers and governments overturned European Commission plans to exempt small transactions, arguing that price volatility and the ability to break up payments into smaller chunks would make it unworkable for crypto.
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Source: No AML Checks For Most Transfers To Unhosted Crypto Wallets, EU Policymakers Decide
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