The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has demanded strict know-your-customer procedures for all small digital asset sales, bringing an end to anonymous crypto exchanges, which can be used for money laundering and terrorism financing.
“In cases where a [Virtual Asset Service Provider] VASP carries out an occasional transaction, however, the designated threshold above which VASPs are required to conduct CDD is USD/EUR 1,000…” according to a paper published by FATF.
In other news, bitcoin tested 15-month highs on Monday (June 24) after rising more than 10 percent over the weekend.
The surge comes as Facebook is set to launch its own digital currency, Libra, which has made investors more optimistic about the future of all cryptos.
“They believe that Libra will create mass awareness of cryptocurrencies and act as a gateway to adoption,” said Mati Greenspan, an analyst at eToro, according to Reuters.
Another reason for the boost is the fact that bitcoin’s next “halving” is in May 2020.
“Bitcoin always does a 200 percent pump within 1 year before the halving and another much, much bigger pump in the year after the halving,” said Stuttgart-based Marius Kramer, a social media influencer who currently works with crypto investing app Ember Fund.
The election of an interim president of Brazil’s National Bank for Economic and Social Development (BNDES) has left the future of a state-backed Brazilian token in limbo.
Last week BNDES announced the election of Finance Director José Flavio Ferreira Ramos as its interim president. The token, dubbed BNDESToken, is set to comprise an ether-based stablecoin backed by the Brazilian real.
The token will not be promoted and can only be issued or exchanged by the bank.
“Instead of releasing the money to the client, the proposal is that we will release the token that can be used for all purchases provided for in the financing agreement,” said Gladstone Arantes Jr., an IT manager who is working on the token’s development, according to Coin Telegraph.
And Mozilla is asking users to update their browsers in order to close holes that allowed hackers to scam Coinbase employees.
According to CoinDesk, two vulnerabilities — CVE-2019-11708 and CVE-2019-11707 — allowed hackers to spear-phish Coinbase employees by tricking them into downloading a piece of spyware to steal logins and other data. The hack didn’t affect Coinbase users.