French Regulator Seeks To Ban Anonymous Crypto Coins

Head of the French Committee and the French National Assembly – Eric Woerth recently proposed a ban on all anonymous cryptocurrencies. Woerth expressed his opinion in a recent report on crypto assets and blockchain technology.

An excerpt from his statement reads as follows:

“It would also have been appropriate to propose a ban on the dissemination and trade in [cryptocurrencies built] to ensure complete anonymity by preventing any identification procedure by design. […] This is the case for a certain number of [cryptocurrencies] (Monero, PIVX, DeepOnion, Zcash…) whose purpose is to bypass any possibility of identifying the holders. To date, regulation has not gone that far.”

In his statement, Woerth goes on to address many other issues pertaining to cryptocurrencies including tax evasion, fraud and money laundering as well as energy consumption. Woerth went on to add:

“The distinction between the different uses of (cryptocurrencies) must continue, to establish a finer and more precise regulation protector of the general interest, as well as the private interest of the entrepreneurs of this domain.”

Notably, last year April saw Japanese regulators call for similar moves which sought to prevent exchanges from trading anonymous crypto assets such as Dash and Monero. As per a statement from an unnamed member at the Financial Services Authority, other regulators had suggested that the topic is brought to a serious discussion in order to determine whether registered exchanges would be allowed to utilise the aptly named privacy coins.

It must be noted that it is not the first time that the French government has considered questionable regulations for the crypto ecosystem. Back in December 2018, the lower house of the French parliament declined suggested amendments to the proposed 2019 finance bill which would have resulted in a possible ease on crypto taxation.

At the same time, the French parliament also rejected a total of four proposals, all which were related to cryptocurrency.

Could the French regulator truly succeed in banning anonymous coins? We’ll have to wait and see.