The cryptocurrency industry should be on its guard. New regulations have been in force since November, tightening the screw of exchanges, exchange offices, and providers of digital wallets. It is about the act on counteracting money laundering and terrorist financing, amended this spring, implementing the fifth anti-money laundering directive.

The changes are not cosmetic. To increase the detection of suspicious coin transactions, the amount of transactions that companies must apply financial security measures has been reduced from €15,000  to just €1,000.

There is also a special register of entities operating in the field of cryptocurrencies at the Ministry of Finance. Failure to meet the obligation on time (companies present on the market have six months to register, counting from November 1, 2021) can cost dearly – the maximum penalty is PLN 100,000. 

The icing on the cake is reputation as well as competence requirements. In practice, this means that natural persons managing such businesses cannot be legally convicted. In addition, they must have at least one year of business experience or training in virtual currencies. The requirement of a clean criminal record also applies to actual beneficiaries (persons exercising control over the company).

"This is a chance for companies to appear in civilized conditions and the only way for reliable entities to operate on the market," Dr. Marcin Daniecki, an advisor to JBW, assessed.

(Puls Biznesu)