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Europe’s new-man laundering watchdog has warned that Crypto assets are its biggest challenge to prevent dirty money infiltrating the financial system of the region.
European Union Anti-Mani Laundering Authority President Bruna Sejo told Financial Times that Crypto market A clear priority is because it is “significantly exposed to money laundering and financing risks of terrorism”.
Europe should be especially on its guard against these risks, because Sejego said, “Our market is quite fragmented and many crypto assets service providers want to get licenses under the new PAN-EU licensing framework launched earlier this year”.
He said that Crypto’s property also brought increased risk due to the ability to conduct their across nature, their ability to be anonymous and the speed with which they could be transferred.
The Amb, which was created last year and its legal powers formally assumed only on 1 July, indicated their intention to focus on the Crypto region by warning about the risk of “inconsistent control” among the national regulators of the European Union.
Szego insisted that the regulators need to look at the beneficial owner of Crypto Asset Service Providers who are their shareholders and where they are “. He said: “We need to ensure that the owners are not involved in money laundering or terrorism finance.”
The French Public Prosecutor said that it was earlier this year Test On the suspicion that the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange broke the European Union money laundering and terrorist financing laws – which the company has denied.
Benance co-founder Changpeng Jhao stepped as his Chief Executive Officer in 2023, before he was sentenced to four months in jail by US authorities, who also imposed a fine of $ 4.3 billion to the company to fail to stop the company’s money laundering and international approval.
Szego said that when Amla takes direct supervision of about 40 of about 40 of the largest and most potentially risky financial institutions in the European Union in 2028, “Some Crypto asset service providers are likely to join the initial 40 financial institutions that we directly care for”.
His important comments resonated by the Financial Action Task Force, an inter -government body to combat terrorism funding and money laundering, which Said last month Many parts of the world continue to “struggle” with regulating crypto assets. It estimated that 75 percent of the global jurisdiction was not fully complied with its needs.
But these warnings are opposite with more crypto-friendly Approach The US administration was taken under President Donald Trump. Washington is Dropped Several high-profile enforcement cases against digital asset groups are close to passing the law to integrate the sector more closely in the mainstream financial system.
Szego said that Amla would consider several initial options to deal with the risks of crypto assets, including the “thematic review” of national authorities and a joint analysis of the market with national financial intelligence units.
The Frankfurt-based authority currently has only 30 employees, but it is running to rent more with a plan to reach 120 employees by the end of the year, by the end of 2026 to 240 and 430 it begins to direct supervision in 2028. “It takes six to nine months to hire someone,” Sejo said.
On Tuesday, Amla said that because the crypto companies’ licensing blocks of the European Union’s licensing block were done by 27 national authorities, “the risk of removing the application of regulatory standards between them”.
It is committed to using its powers to monitor national authorities to ensure that they only approve crypto companies that have “effective” effective compliance system. Szego said that it was important for crypto companies that “there is someone on the board”-Money understands the laundering and anti-terrorism finance.