"EU Moves Closer to Strict Anti-Money Laundering Rules on Crypto"

Info via Bloomberg (gated) of interest to cryptocurrency.

• The European Parliament and Council reached a provisional agreement to force crypto providers to provide identifying information on all digital asset transactions, despite an industry backlash.
• The so-called transfer of funds regulation, or TFR, seeks to strengthen anti-money laundering requirements to ensure that crypto transfers can always be traced and suspicious transactions blocked. The deal means that exchanges must obtain information and personal data on all crypto transfers, no matter the size, and provide that information to authorities if requested. It also extends that responsibility to so-called unhosted wallets — which are not managed by a licensed exchange or service.

Anonymity is a key selling point for crypto - moves to diminish it are not a bullish input at the margin.

Bitcoin Bitcoin Bitcoin is the largest and world’s first digital currency launched back in 2009 by the entity, Satoshi Nakamoto. Being a digital currency, a defining feature of Bitcoin is that it functions without a central bank or single administrator. Rather, Bitcoin instead can be sent by peer-to-peer (P2P) networking, which is itself absent of any intermediaries.Instead of being a physical currency, Bitcoins represent pieces of digital code that can be sent and received across a kind of distributed ledger n Bitcoin is the largest and world’s first digital currency launched back in 2009 by the entity, Satoshi Nakamoto. Being a digital currency, a defining feature of Bitcoin is that it functions without a central bank or single administrator. Rather, Bitcoin instead can be sent by peer-to-peer (P2P) networking, which is itself absent of any intermediaries.Instead of being a physical currency, Bitcoins represent pieces of digital code that can be sent and received across a kind of distributed ledger n Read this Term update: