Alex Coin 
Europe’s lawmakers voted in favour of the “ Funds Transfer Regulations “, a move that could put an end to anonymous anonymity is when something is not known or named. cryptocurrency transactions, even the smallest ones.
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The Parliament of the European Union (EU) voted on Thursday in favour of acontrovertida regla que atenta contra el anonimato de las criptomonedas y podría limitar el uso de las billeteras autocustodia en todo el bloque.
European lawmakers approved the so-called “ Funds Transfer Regulations ” (TFR) en una votación celebrada este 31 de marzo. El medio de noticias CoinDesk he said. Parliamentarian Stefan Berger also made known the unfavorable results for the digital digital technologies are these electronic tools that have the ability to generate, store or even process data. currencies sector through his Twitter account.
“ I very much regret the results of the amendments to TFR . This weakens Europe as a location for innovation. ” wrote Berger, who noted that the provision had won bipartisan approval in the House.
I regret the results on the amendments to the #TFR very much. This weakens Europe as a location for innovation.
– Stefan Berger (@DrStefanBerger) March 31, 2022
As previously reviewed DiarioBitcoin The regulations in question propose a revision to the current Transfer of Funds Regulations (TFR) to expand the requirement for instructions to attach information about parties transacting in cryptocurrencies. It also seeks to include transactions with digital assets from non-custodial usually referring to the storage of keys, in relation to wallets or exchanges, a non-custodial setup is one in which private keys are held by the user directly. wallets to anti-money laundering (AML) controls.
What do the regulations say?
A form ofThe Block a file containing information on transactions completed during a given time period. Blocks are the constituent parts of a blockchain.who reviewed the latest draft of the legislation, said that the rule would require that users of ” crypto asset transfer providers “, usually cryptocurrency exchanges, report the identity of the beneficial owner of non-hosted wallets to the crypto-exchanges from which they are transferring funds.
As such, the rule would also require merchant platforms that facilitate such transfers to verify such identifying information. At the same time, the regulation would extend the anti-money laundering requirements that apply to conventional payments above €1,000 (USD $1,114) to the cryptocurrency sector.
The central issue with these requirements is that in many cases, it could be difficult – if not impossible – for cryptocurrency service providers to verify a non-custodian counterparty. Patrick Hansen, from the firm Blockchain a distributed ledger system. A sequence of blocks, or units of digital information, stored consecutively in a public database. The basis for cryptocurrencies. Unstoppable DeFi a movement encouraging alternatives to traditional, centralized forms of financial services. previously warned that these measures could lead to the closure of smaller companies in the sector and undermine the growth of the industry in Europe.
It should be noted that the term self-custodial wallets, also called “non-hosted” or “non-custodial,” refers to software or hardware for storing digital assets that is not in the hands of an intermediary or third party. Some examples of such wallets are MetaMask an online digital wallet that allows users to manage, transfer and receive Ethereum, operating as an extension to a regular browser. , WalletConnect , Ledger a record of financial transactions that cannot be changed, only appended with new transactions. y Trezor .
The regulation itself defines them as “ a cryptoasset a cryptoasset is any digital asset that uses cryptographic technologies to maintain its operation as a currency or decentralized application. wallet a place where cryptocurrency users can store, send and receive digital assets. address a place where cryptocurrency can be sent to and from, in the form of a string of letters and numbers. that is not held or administered by a cryptoasset transfer provider “, según recogió The Block.
Rule passed despite criticism
According to CoinDesk A separate legal proposal also discussed today would prevent transfers to “non-compliant” cryptographic service providers, which include those that operate in the EU without authorization or that are not affiliated or established in any jurisdiction.
Members of the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) reportedly opposed many of the most controversial changes and condemned what they called a “…a “political crisis”. de facto ban on self-hosted wallets “. Among them, Berger (member of the EPP) condemned the position of his S&D counterparts (Socialists and Democrats), who supported the reforms.
However, despite the fact that the EPP has the largest number of seats in the EU Parliament, the reform passed, apparently with the votes of members of both parties, both “the EPP and the EPP”. rojos ” as “ verdes “, as revealed by Berger. The vote also went ahead to despite the objections of industry leaders and the warnings of legal experts.
“ Esta revisión desataría todo un régimen de vigilancia en intercambios como Coinbase, sofocaría la innovación y socavaría las billeteras autohospedadas que las personas usan para proteger de forma segura sus activos digitales “Paul Grewal, the platform’s legal director, said in a press release. blog post . Also the CEO of Coinbase is an American company that operates a cryptocurrency exchange platform. , Brian Armstrong, se expressed its opposition .
This destroys all the work of the EU to be a world leader in privacy law and policy. It also disproportionately punishes cryptocurrency cryptocurrencies are digital currencies that use cryptographic technologies to secure their operation. holders and undermines their individual rights in a very worrying way. It is bad policy.
Next steps in European crypto-regulation
After its last approval, the regulation now will either go to a plenary vote involving the whole Parliament or potentially go directly to trilogues or discussions involving the European Commission and the European Council. as noted byThe Block.
The TFR vote is the latest regulatory threat to the cryptocurrency industry in Europe. Just a few days ago, concerns revolved around an EU proposal to ban the use of proof-of-work poW is a type of consensus algorithm that rewards validators according to the amount of computational power they have expended. based cryptocurrencies ( PoW ) as Bitcoin the biggest and most popular cryptocurrency in the world. It is a decentralized digital currency that enables users to make trustless peer-to-peer transactions. .
Fortunately for industry enthusiasts, that controversial provision included in the MiCA framework, was rejected by European legislators . The European Parliament, the European Commission and the European Council are currently in a more advanced process of discussion for the approval of MiCA, the legislative framework that seeks to regulate digital currencies across the bloc.
- EU to continue discussing its crypto-regulatory framework with no provision to ban Bitcoin
- European Union could take action against crypto wallets for self-custodial wallets
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Article by Hannah Estefania Perez / DiarioBitcoin
Imagen de Unsplash
