coinspeaker.com
OKEx Korea exchange has decided to delist five privacy coins: Monero (XMR), Dash (DASH), Zcash (ZEC), Horizen (ZEN) and Super Bitcoin (SBTC). According to the exchange, they violate the Financial Action Task Force (FATF’s) ‘travel rule’.
The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 with the aim to set standards and promote effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system. It is an international regulatory body that generates the necessary legislative and regulatory reforms and monitors the progress of its members in implementing necessary measures.
In June of this year, FATF issued their final guideline concerning cryptocurrencies. The guideline provides standards combating money laundering and terrorism and includes the much-debated ‘travel rule,’ requiring exchanges to collect and transfer customer information during transactions and, if required, provide it to the concerned authorities. This information includes the originator’s name, account number, and location data, as well as the name and account number of the beneficiary.
At that time, OKEx stated:
“For one, transactions themselves need to be routinely monitored, ostensibly to detect unusual and potentially criminal patterns. S
econdly, a new ‘travel rule’ necessitates that exchanges and money transmitters share customer info with each other, so that one exchange can confirm, for example, that a customer on another platform it’s sending 10 bitcoins to has a verified identity.”
Privacy coins are coins that ensure the privacy and anonymity of its users. They rely on the same blockchain technology as cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin but handle information about transactions in a different way. Privacy coins conceal information about senders and receivers during transactions and hide data about wallet activity or at least offer this feature to users. That’s why they are delisted by the South-Korean unit of the leading OKEx exchange.
An OKEx Korea spokesperson stated:
“[Anonymity tokens] violate the laws of regulatory agencies and major institutions. The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has recommended abiding by the Travel Rule, and we are taking steps to follow it.”
According to the post by OKEx Korea which refers to Monero, Dash, Zcash, Horizen and Super Bitcoin as ‘dark coins’, the mentioned currencies will be delisted on October 10. The deadline for final withdrawals for the coins is set for December 10. By now, the decision has been taken only for the Korean unit.
Other crypto exchanges may follow OKEx Korea in their decision. Earlier, Coinbase started delisting the privacy-based cryptocurrency ZCash from its platform for all the U.K customers. From August 26, users are unable to hold any ZCash balance.
At that time, Coinbase explained this decision by the pressure from HM Revenue & Customs, the British tax authority, that required all the exchanges to reveal customers’ names and transaction histories, in a bid to claw back unpaid taxes.