The EU wants transparency on Cryptocurrencies

[Ultegra134]

Stumbled upon this article today.

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/security/20180404STO00913/plenary-vote-stricter-eu-rules-on-money-laundering-and-terrorism-financing

According to the European Parliament, in order to fight money laundering and terrorism financing, they proposed a new legislation to regulate cryptocurrencies. Quoting from the article:

The new legislation would also require virtual currency exchange platforms and custodian wallet providers to exercise due diligence and end the anonymity associated with such exchanges. “Now we say that platform providers and those who keep bitcoins in their wallet need to know their customers just as banks do. It is quite revolutionary,” explains Sargentini.

In simple words, they actually want wallet providers to require more information from us, similar to banks.

What are your thoughts on this? Could this ever happen?

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[Don Pedro Dinero]

This can be very big.

When reading the sentence: “those who keep bitcoins in their wallet” it is not clear to me if that affects to hardware wallets for example. They could ask Trezor and Ledger to know their customers before selling and to hand over their data to the EU. I’ve read the article but can’t find an explanation. Until now we thought that regulation was going to reach exchanges, but we also thought that we would have some freedom using wallets.

[trumper]

I think because of that monero cannot be listed on coinbase etc. But rather on decentralized exchanges. It may make them less valuable in the future, I don't think they will be valuable while no central authority sympathises it.

[Ctn]

Stumbled upon this article today.

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/security/20180404STO00913/plenary-vote-stricter-eu-rules-on-money-laundering-and-terrorism-financing

According to the European Parliament, in order to fight money laundering and terrorism financing, they proposed a new legislation to regulate cryptocurrencies. Quoting from the article:

The new legislation would also require virtual currency exchange platforms and custodian wallet providers to exercise due diligence and end the anonymity associated with such exchanges. “Now we say that platform providers and those who keep bitcoins in their wallet need to know their customers just as banks do. It is quite revolutionary,” explains Sargentini.

In simple words, they actually want wallet providers to require more information from us, similar to banks.

What are your thoughts on this? Could this ever happen?

Is it really new thing or the old one. I mean isn't our regional wallets are already asking for the KYC documents before we could start the transaction on the same? I mean I know this one is about the exchanger itself but to reach the exchanger we need money from our wallets, and wallets can be tracked with KYC info and thus it becomes completely transparent too.

If exchangers started asking for the more info which would be obvious the KYC's then also it will be the same thing as before only the mega difference would be "we will need to pay taxes on every dime that we are earning online". I mean unlike today where we can earn from bounties, trade online and keep the BTC over there only hides our wealth 100% but after this rule it wont happen. So its kind of bad thing.

[ironman2014]

It's impossible, it's fighting against windmills. If they control one coin, we can simply create another one - completely anonymous.

[maurobiasolo]

EU is working hard on privacy, blockchain and cryptocurrencies. With regards to this article, I think they want to track activities mostly for tax purposes. Terrorism is just an excuse: terrorists are much more likely to use USD or EUR than crypto

[ss890]

Stumbled upon this article today.

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/security/20180404STO00913/plenary-vote-stricter-eu-rules-on-money-laundering-and-terrorism-financing

According to the European Parliament, in order to fight money laundering and terrorism financing, they proposed a new legislation to regulate cryptocurrencies. Quoting from the article:

The new legislation would also require virtual currency exchange platforms and custodian wallet providers to exercise due diligence and end the anonymity associated with such exchanges. “Now we say that platform providers and those who keep bitcoins in their wallet need to know their customers just as banks do. It is quite revolutionary,” explains Sargentini.

In simple words, they actually want wallet providers to require more information from us, similar to banks.

What are your thoughts on this? Could this ever happen?

Thats really interesting article to read. Yes I do believe that this change will be good one for the peoples around the globe. The terrorism acts can not be tacked with it but off course the mega transaction can be traced out with it. There are only few instances when the mega transaction will occur in the first place. The first one could be about the richest guy withdrawing his money, second one could be exchanger transaction itself and the last one could be suspicious activities like those mentioned in the article itself. So if EU successfully implement this thing then there could be chances that it will be helpful for tracing it.

 

EU is working hard on privacy, blockchain and cryptocurrencies. With regards to this article, I think they want to track activities mostly for tax purposes. Terrorism is just an excuse: terrorists are much more likely to use USD or EUR than crypto

Off course many possibilities could be taken from this one. They might just do both the things together.

[Artlee87]

This would be difficult to really implement considering the rate at which cryptocurrencies are growing and how big of a market it has already become. Like another user mentioned, hardware wallets exist too, and those can easily change hands many times after the original purchase (regulating the POS/companies that sell hardware wallets [which are essentially encrypted flash drives]).

[GoldenLad]

What is then the need of decentralized privacy monetary transactions when privacy is being altered? I don't know if this story is really genuine, but if it is, then it makes no sense to own digital coins anymore. What we need is regulations in cryptocurrency which will help to reduce fraud activities in digital coins (if that is truly their intention). If they can't provide that then its of no use.

[Fazlurkhan.kz]

Regulation of cryptocurrencies is indeed an issue faced by the majority of countries governments as they just find it as a threat as cryptocurrencies can be used as a tool to hide loads of black money, save one from paying taxes, utilization of those currencies in illegal activities could increase resulting in an indirect way to the lives of the common people. If some centralization is done to the crypto world then that would help the government to at least keep a track of where exactly is bitcoin actually circulating and allowing them to minimize its usage for any dark activity.

[hualangktsld841]

The EU's idea of digital money purse is hard to really carry out. But we can understand this news. Now the European Union countries are paying more and more attention to digital currency. As we all know, the European Union's economy has been very bad in the past ten years. They may be eager to find new economic engines by using bitcoin as a breakthrough.

[player514]

It's impossible, it's fighting against windmills. If they control one coin, we can simply create another one - completely anonymous.

Yup, if there were actual regulators, then the people would just end up creating different coins. It's the cat-mouse game here. I guess the only issue I could see coming out of this would be that the general population would need to be alerted of the creation of a new coin. People have to actually start supporting that new coin, and that could be a dangerous game. People in general hate change, and to swap their holdings to a new coin, which might not seem too much for you and I, would be a huge change for the average Joe. Regulations would definitely hurt the coins price, but I don't think it would mean the coin is done for.

[pvk444]

This is a two edged sword.

For one, any governmental control goes against the fundamental philosophy of bitcoin.

But on the other hand, this shows that politicians start taking cryptocurrencies seriously.

On the whole though, I think this is a good development. It requires some give and take, but if it's done properly, it will give users some protection similar to that found in regulated markets, while not giving up too much of the privacy and anonymity afforded by crypto currencies. Furthermore, such an at least "weakly" regulated market is essential for broad adoption by mainstream businesses, which in turn is essential for cryptocurrencies to reach the next growth segment.

[1Referee]

I think because of that monero cannot be listed on coinbase etc. But rather on decentralized exchanges. It may make them less valuable in the future, I don't think they will be valuable while no central authority sympathises it.

The point is that Monero shouldn't be listed on any centralized exchange if we purely look at its main purpose, which is offering an extra layer of privacy. If you plan to buy Monero through whatever centralized exchange for that purpose, and think logically, you don't have any privacy already at that point, so it's pointless to even proceed buying Monero. If centralized exchanges at some point will decide to not list it at all, or to even remove it due to regulatory pressure, the value will definitely take a hit if people aren't switching to decentralized exchanges to keep trading it. It's probably the only altcoin I actually like for its features. Privacy is a very important aspect, but one that not many people appreciate at this stage, which is sad.

[stompix]

In simple words, they actually want wallet providers to require more information from us, similar to banks.

What are your thoughts on this? Could this ever happen?

Well, they pretty much know that already.
Most exchanges licensed in the EU require AML and KYC and either way, the transfers of fiat are recorded already by the banks, so there is little you can hide there.

This can be very big.

When reading the sentence: “those who keep bitcoins in their wallet” it is not clear to me if that affects to hardware wallets for example. They could ask Trezor and Ledger to know their customers before selling and to hand over their data to the EU. I’ve read the article but can’t find an explanation. Until now we thought that regulation was going to reach exchanges, but we also thought that we would have some freedom using wallets.

The term that is most important I think is custodian :

custodian wallet providers

So Trezor isn't qualifying for this if we consider that they don't really hold control over your funds. They are more like strongbox sellers than a bank lending you a strongbox.
At least that would be the interpretation here.

From my point of view this one can be neglected as people should start learning not to keep their coins on a 3rd party wallet service or platform or whatever.

Bitcoin gave us the possibility of being a bank, why stuff the safe in a bank and on top of that give them the code and the keys?

[aoluain]

What about Dash and Zcash they also offer superior privacy.

The whole thing about counteracting the anonymity of crypto
Goes against the findamentals of it but I understand the need
to counteract illegal activity.

Wouldnt mixing transactions trump any steps put in place to
Counteract illegal activity?

[Ultegra134]

This is a two edged sword.

For one, any governmental control goes against the fundamental philosophy of bitcoin.

But on the other hand, this shows that politicians start taking cryptocurrencies seriously.

On the whole though, I think this is a good development. It requires some give and take, but if it's done properly, it will give users some protection similar to that found in regulated markets, while not giving up too much of the privacy and anonymity afforded by crypto currencies. Furthermore, such an at least "weakly" regulated market is essential for broad adoption by mainstream businesses, which in turn is essential for cryptocurrencies to reach the next growth segment.

Definitely, governments are taking into account the widespread and resilience of cryptocurrencies, thus trying to take action to either halt their advance or actually legislate measures that will also help cryptocurrencies develop in the advanced world.

 That way, with the interference of governments, it could also become a way of payment one day, providing that they don't want to halt their advance, which is highly unlikely now, due to their nature and accomplishments, rendering too late to actually fight them.

[bangkit tri]

The EU's idea of digital money purse is hard to really carry out. But we can understand this news. Now the European Union countries are paying more and more attention to digital currency. As we all know, the European Union's economy has been very bad in the past ten years. They may be eager to find new economic engines by using bitcoin as a breakthrough.

your analysis may be true, because bitcoin will be good in the future, so indeed this is a breakthrough to improve the economy in EU, we can imagine if they go early and btc soaring, it really helps economy in that EU country

[Lampaster]

This is a two edged sword.

For one, any governmental control goes against the fundamental philosophy of bitcoin.

But on the other hand, this shows that politicians start taking cryptocurrencies seriously.

On the whole though, I think this is a good development. It requires some give and take, but if it's done properly, it will give users some protection similar to that found in regulated markets, while not giving up too much of the privacy and anonymity afforded by crypto currencies. Furthermore, such an at least "weakly" regulated market is essential for broad adoption by mainstream businesses, which in turn is essential for cryptocurrencies to reach the next growth segment.

At the beginning of your post to say correctly. It is contrary to all what was created by bitcoin. To allow the legalization of cryptocurrencies is a betrayal. I think you're wrong. Any regulation of the cryptocurrency from the state will lead to a decline in demand. Moreover, it can kill bitcoin. We can't let that happen.

[South Park]

This can be very big.

When reading the sentence: “those who keep bitcoins in their wallet” it is not clear to me if that affects to hardware wallets for example. They could ask Trezor and Ledger to know their customers before selling and to hand over their data to the EU. I’ve read the article but can’t find an explanation. Until now we thought that regulation was going to reach exchanges, but we also thought that we would have some freedom using wallets.

If that is the case then people will begin to avoid hardware wallets as well, when it's obvious that regulation is coming it seems that governments are not realizing how difficult it is going to be to go against bitcoin cryptocurrencies, does that mean they want that even desktop wallets require you to identify yourself before you are allowed to download the software? Because that is not going to happen.