FATF Schedules Meeting to Discuss Global Compliance with Travel Rule

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) had scheduled a plenary meeting, planned for the 24th of June, 2020. This meeting will have the goal of assessing how the Virtual Asset Services Providers (VASPs) have progressed in the enforcement of the FATF’s so-called “Travel Rule.”

Time To Review

Forbes’ Pawel Kuskowski had already explained that the FATF would hold the meeting in two weeks’ time, doing so in a virtual format. There, the meeting will discuss the guidelines the organization has set out to try and make VASPs across the globe compliant with Anti-Terrorist Financing (ATF) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations. Kuskowski explained that the jurisdictions of FATF members must demonstrate the progress they had made on the implementation of the Travel Rule. Thus, each member jurisdiction will have their efforts reviewed during the meeting on the 24th of June.

Back in June of 2019, the FATF requested that global regulators adopt the guidelines for its AML measures within their cryptocurrency regulations. These guidelines quickly became known as the Travel Rule and provide a range of measures for both ATF and AML. These were aimed at exchanges in order to prevent the illegal usage of cryptocurrencies.

Not Mandated, But Definitely Encouraged

The FATF has gone public in saying that it will monitor the levels of implementation of these new requirements, doing so by country and service provider. Furthermore, they warned that they will conduct a 12-month review in June of 2020, which is now. This essentially gave the crypto industry a year to implement these regulations.

However, it should be noted that these guidelines on their own aren’t legally binding, per se. Yet, they have the capacity to be effective in doing what it set out to do. Any nation that doesn’t comply with the FATF by the deadline period may very well be excluded from the global financial network, as a result.

A Meagre 10%

Micheal Ou, the CEO of CoolBitX, gave a statement about the matter, as well. CoolBitX is working to develop technology that specifically ensures compliance with this travel rule.

Ou claimed that only 20 of the 200 countries that make up the FATF have issued out regulations that keep the Travel Rule into consideration. However, Ou was quick to point out that the remaining states had made significant progress in legislation like it, which will be discussed in the meeting on the 24th of June.