The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) said Thursday that it will extend the reporting period for the proposed new crypto wallet regulation by another 15 days and the requirement to keep records and counterparty comments by another 45 days.
New provisions from FinCEN
First introduced on December 18, the FinCEN bill would require exchanges to store information such as the name and address of customers who transfer over $ 3.000 per day in cryptocurrencies to private wallets and to archive currency transaction reports for clients. customers who transact over $ 10.000 per day on platforms such as Bitcoin Revolution.
The law refers only to US citizens. Some critics of the bill have argued that it would be technically impossible for some projects to comply because smart contracts and decentralized tools often don't contain information on the name or address to be provided.
Perhaps this decision to extend the comment period to 15 days means that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who is said to lead this action, will step down by the end of that phase, allowing FinCEN to gain better awareness of the industry feedback. In a public note, FinCEN called the proposal "vital" to cut possible loopholes that terrorists or other malicious actors could use.
FinCEN was less expansive regarding record keeping and counterparty details, writing only: “FinCEN is providing a longer period in light of the slightly greater complexity of those aspects of the proposed rule and various issues identified in comments received during the period. of initial comment ".
Hope in the Biden-Harris administration
The question of the opening period for comments was the part that raised the most controversy within the crypto sector, receiving over 7.000 comments, most of which criticized the law or the haste with which they moved the procedure.
In a statement, the Digital Chamber of Commerce said that if the proposed rule had been implemented as is, "a number of unintended consequences that would have raised serious privacy concerns would have arisen from this hasty regulatory process."
The extension granted does not mean that the rule will not be implemented; it is still entirely possible that FinCEN will choose to move forward with this bill after the publication of the final version.
The proceedings will resume when the document is published in the federal register. Dayton Young, product director of Fight for the Future, welcomed the extension of the comment period, saying, “We call on the Biden-Harris administration to listen to the public and reject the previous administration's attack on our rights to privacy. We need more than just a change of leadership at the Treasury; we need a change in values and ideology if we want to stop financial surveillance ”.
