What to Expect at G-20: Money Laundering and Crypto Discussion

One of the main themes to be discussed at the G-20 Financial Ministers and Central Governors Meeting this weekend has to do with money laundering and cryptocurrency.

What kind of agreement would be a surprise? Even for the purpose of introducing Anti-Money Laundering, should we allow our financial privacy to be compromised? Alexander Zaidelson, the CEO of Beam, shared his views with Cointelegraph.

He summarized the FATF draft as an agreement in the industry that "Certain standards, including proper Know Your Customer, enhanced due diligence, transaction monitoring, and suspicious activity reporting are necessary to combat money laundering".

The Financial Action Task Force is an intergovernmental body formed to fight money laundering and combat the financing of terrorism.

According to Alexander Zaidelson, the CEO of a privacy coin-centered Beam, the governments "May eventually strengthen the regulatory scrutiny to on- and off-ramps, i.e. places where cryptocurrency can be converted into Fiat currency, mostly exchanges" He also added that there also may be an "Attack" on unregulated exchanges.

Beam is known as a privacy coin that adopts a protocol called MimbleWimble, which seeks to improve both privacy and scalability at the same time.

Although it is possible that the regulators could make it difficult to convert fully anonymous coins to fiat, Zaidelson argues that privacy coins' opt-in compliance can deal with that case.

"I think that privacy is a basic human right," according to Zaidelson, which he thinks is something to keep in mind when talking about money laundering.

The European GDPR laws, which were enacted to protect privacy, have clear rules that outline when the transmission of personal data warranted, including if it is 'in the public interest,' or necessary to protect the public."

It might be worthwhile checking what the G-20 agreement this weekend might imply for the balance between privacy and money laundering.