India and many other countries have been worried about how cryptocurrencies are being used to launder money illegally for a while now. Given the situation, the Financial Action Task Force's main objective has changed to promoting the adoption of worldwide regulations against crypto-related money laundering (FATF). In order to avoid being "grey flagged," the Paris-based global financial watchdog has, in a sense, demanded that nations abide by its anti-money laundering (AML) standards.
The countries on the FATF's "grey list" are those that the international financial watchdog is examining more closely.
According to Al Jazeera, which cited individuals familiar with the issue, the FATF intends to conduct annual audits across nations to ensure that each is following preventative laws against the use of cryptocurrency in money laundering and terror funding.
According to FATF recommendations, the governments of numerous nations must gather identifying data on the senders, recipients, and beneficiaries of virtual assets. All virtual asset service providers (VASPs) must be registered and licensed in each country, according to the legislation.
According to reports, the UAE, the Cayman Islands, and the Philippines all had "strategic inadequacies" in March when it came to upholding anti-money laundering regulations.
The findings have compelled the FATF to close the loophole for other countries testing out crypto activity.
The overall ranking of the nations on the global index may suffer if FATF's anti-money laundering criteria are not followed. Some countries might hence be automatically placed among the more closely watched ones and lose access to certain financial privileges and facilitations on a global scale.
In the next days, India will assume the G20 group president, and it will hold that position for the following 12 months.
According to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, no one nation can manage and create adequate regulations to protect crypto assets from market volatility that is commonplace as well as digital asset exploit situations.
Cryptocurrencies are frequently utilized to transfer significant sums of money to foreign locations while maintaining anonymity because they are not controlled by a central bank or regulatory authority.
Sitharaman mentioned the use of cryptocurrencies in money laundering as a major issue related to digital assets in her statement at the most recent press briefing.
