The new bill will require owners of cryptocurrency companies to provide more personal data to the UK Companies House (CH).
The UK government has proposed a series of reforms that will provide more oversight of cryptocurrencies “for the purposes of combating money laundering and terrorist financing.” The rules will be laid out in a new economic crimes bill aimed at addressing the problem of “using cryptocurrencies to hide their illegal origin.”
The changes should tighten the requirements for data submitted to CH by cryptocurrency companies. All British companies regularly submit financial reports and other information to this department. The new rules will require applicants to provide more personal information.
The reforms come amid Britain’s economic crimes bill, which introduces the Foreign Business Registry and requires foreign business owners to disclose their full identity to avoid shell companies being used to conceal income.
The bill, which tightens the requirements for the personal data of owners of cryptocurrency companies, has been in development for a long time and now the ministry is ready to submit it for approval.
The UK has come close to creating a legal framework for regulating cryptocurrencies, and thanks to Brexit it can do it faster than the European Union, which has so far adopted only two provisions of the future law on cryptocurrencies. Recently, Conservative MP Matt Hancock said that a restrictive EU policy on cryptocurrencies would not benefit the UK crypto industry. The President of the ECB is also of the opinion that it is necessary to speed up the creation of the regulatory framework. Last week, the head of the European Central Bank, Christine Lagarde, called for speeding up the adoption of a law on the regulation of cryptocurrencies in the EU.
