US Treasury secretary voices support for new FATF rules regarding crypto exchanges

Steven Mnuchin, secretary of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, is in favor of the latest guidelines handed to cryptocurrency exchanges by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), according to a Bloomberg report.

The global money-laundering watchdog announced last week that cryptocurrency exchanges need to collect and transfer customer information during transactions. Mnuchin said that with these guidelines, the FATF will ensure that “virtual asset service providers do not operate in the dark shadows."

"This will enable the emerging FinTech sector to stay one-step ahead of rogue regimes and sympathizers of illicit causes searching for avenues to raise and transfer funds without detection," Mnuncin added.

However, execs at leading cryptocurrency companies like Circle, Coinbase and Chainalysis believe that adhering to the FATF guidelines could be costly to implement and force unprecedented collaboration between exchanges.