Bitcoin Daily: EU Official Proposes Ending Anonymous Crypto Sales; FTX Raises $900 Million; Fidelity Reports Growing Interest In Crypto

With rising reports of crypto fraud, the European Commission (EC) of the European Union (EU) has proposed a rule banning anonymous transactions, according to remarks from EC Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis published on Tuesday, July 20. Per the remarks from Dombrovskis, any crypto transactions would have to “be accompanied by the details of sender and beneficiary.”

“Experts estimate that around 1% of the EU’s annual GDP [gross domestic product] is linked to suspect financial activity. While the scale of laundering is difficult to assess, we are talking about many billions of euros in dirty money that is highly mobile and often invisible,” wrote Dombrovskis.

He cited a particular money laundering case that ended up hitting several banks in 2019. He said there were still loopholes in anti-money-laundering rules.

Dombrovskis announced that they would create a new EU Anti-Money Laundering Authority (AMLA) and indicated that more coordination is needed to make sure the rules are correctly enforced.

Meanwhile, crypto exchange FTX has announced that it closed a Series B funding round with $900 million, a Tuesday (July 20) press release said.

The company is now valued at $18 billion.

With the new funding, FTX will be expanding its global presence and overall growth. It also comes as one of the largest raises for a crypto company to date.

FTX will also be looking to grow its network of partnerships to help it expand its growth for its products.

More than 60 investors participated in the round, including Paradigm, Sequoia Capital, Thoma Bravo, SoftBank, Ribbit Capital, Insight Partners, Third Point, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Altimeter, BOND, NEA, Coinbase Ventures, Willoughby Capital, 40North, Senator Investment Group, Sino Global Capital, Multicoin, the Paul Tudor Jones family, Izzy Englander, Alan Howard, VanEck, Hudson River Trading and Circle.

According to the Fidelity Digital Assets 2021 Institutional Investor Study, 7 in 10 institutional investors think they’ll be buying or investing in digital assets in the future.

Over 90 percent of institutional investors interested in digital assets also expressed interest in allocating digital assets in their clients’ portfolios within the next five years.

The forecast, according to the study, shows a continuation of the adoption of digital assets. Approximately half of investors in Asia, the U.S. and Europe currently invest in digital assets.