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back to article Australian money cops gain powers to regulate cryptocurrency

Australia has decided digital currencies need the same level of regulation enjoyed by other currencies. Justice minister Michael Keenan yesterday announced an intention to “strengthen the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act” and give more digi-dollar regulatory powers to the Australian Transactions and …

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  1. TReko
    WTF?

    Property is the best way to launder money in Australia

    Meanwhile, Australia’s greatest money-laundering bonanza, property, continues to wash money for criminals and terrorists everywhere.

    In 2015, the global regulator of money laundering – the Paris-based Financial Action Taskforce (FATF) – released its mutual evaluation report which found Australian homes are a haven for laundered funds, particularly from China.

    Just consider “Highrise” Harry Triguboff’s comments in July in The AFR regarding Chinese buyers:

    “The problem with Australians is they are very slow. They ask their lawyer, they ask their financial adviser, they ask their family, they ask everybody. The Chinese don’t ask anybody, they come off the plane, buy their unit and go.”

    7 0 Reply
    1. Nick Kew
      Reply Icon

      Re: Property is the best way to launder money in Australia

      Damn, that's well-known in Blighty - particularly London. No surprise to hear it applies in Oz too.

      Does the Oz government pour vast amounts of taxpayers' money into ever-more-elaborate schemes to push property prices higher, killing off market economics and making the people dependent? Ours has been doing that for a very long time.

      6 0 Reply
      1. TrumpSlurp the Troll
        Reply Icon

        Re: Property is the best way to launder money in Australia

        I assume that NZ might get a look in as well.

        Plenty of rich Asian property investors there.

        0 1 Reply
    2. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Property is the best way to launder money in Australia

      That's not just in Australia.

      Rumour has it that a well known apparent Nazi & white suprematist sympathiser has built his whole empire on it..

      1 4 Reply
    3. Doctor Syntax Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Property is the best way to launder money in Australia

      “The problem with Australians is they are very slow. They ask their lawyer, they ask their financial adviser, they ask their family, they ask everybody. The Chinese don’t ask anybody, they come off the plane, buy their unit and go.”

      Easy come, easy go. If it was you you did the hard earning of the cash you're careful of it on your only purchase. If not then you can afford a few misses amongst the many.

      1 0 Reply
      1. LaeMing
        Reply Icon
        Facepalm

        Re: Property is the best way to launder money in Australia

        And a lot of those Chinese property investors are now being foreclosed at a loss as the rental returns the property-developers promised them never happened (over-saturated market) and they can't legally export enough of their own money from China to make up the difference to keep up the loan repayments.

        Slap-face icon because investing in markets one doesn't understand on the advice of the people selling you the investment is like taking health advice from the fast food industry.

        I was living in China when they opened the stock markets there to every rich-without-work wannabe and I am seeing a pattern here! (Of course, all the money they lost on the CSM was the Government's fault, not the naive investors running simplistic numbers-games on the index, neither knowing or caring what they were actually investing in!)

        0 0 Reply
  2. Mark 85

    I'm surprised that they beat the US and UK to this... The race is truly on.

    3 0 Reply
    1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
      Reply Icon

      I believe the SEC in the US ruled on one of the Bitcoin exchanges that went down, earlier this year. They sort of looked at it as a test case of what their procedures should be, and they decided that digital currencies meet the definition of a security. So they're already subject to existing legislation and regs.

      Obviously that doesn't mean much enforcement is happening yet. Nor does it mean that's been tested in court, but I'm sure there'll end up being a test case at some point.

      1 0 Reply
    2. Alistair
      Reply Icon

      The race is truly on.

      But the *finish* will be completely spectacular, at the rock on the bottom.

      2 0 Reply
  3. Long John Brass
    Facepalm

    Why don't they just ...

    Pass a law?

    In OZ the laws of mathematics are all well and good, but the laws of Australia override all others... Right?

    3 0 Reply
    1. LaeMing
      Reply Icon
      Facepalm

      Re: Why don't they just ...

      Yes, when a certain US state tabled a law to make Pi equal to exactly 3, I believe it was intended satirically. Australian politicians then have to go and think the same way but for realsies.

      0 0 Reply
  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    hmm so will i now be able to claim my lost revenue from power

    1 0 Reply
    1. LaeMing
      Reply Icon

      As soon as you converted back to $AU, I am pretty sure that would already have been a legit deduction, since the power was clearly used in the generation of the income. (IANATaxAccountant, though.)

      Now, though, you may not have to even convert back to $AU, so your question is still interesting.

      0 0 Reply
  5. Pascal Monett Silver badge

    "digital currencies need the same level of regulation"

    It was only a question of time.

    That said, it just might calm things down if so-called Exchanges are under regulatory supervision. As long as they all are.

    I wonder if we'll start seeing black market, unregulated exchanges ? After all, it's virtual money, and BitCoin showed that it could be forked.

    1 0 Reply
  6. TrumpSlurp the Troll

    Regulation? How?

    If the exchanges aren't in Australia then regulation may be a problem.

    I assume that they will go for the point where real cash is generated or real goods are paid for.

    Does that mean that all the outlets which accept Bitcoin, for instance, will have in future to only deal with regulated exchanges?

    Popcorn time?

    2 2 Reply
    1. Greyeye
      Reply Icon

      Re: Regulation? How?

      you cannot regulate foreign exchanges, or crypto only changes, but for the exchanges where they deal with fiat currencies, tighter regulation may apply.

      1 0 Reply
  7. Panicnow

    Sell your Bitcoins NOW!

    IMHO Crypto currencies are only valued because of the money laundering possibilities. As soon as they are regulated, this disappears. I hope Aus govt just declare trading in them is de-facto money laundering ( no new laws needed) The ponzi scheme them implodes and people have to start paying taxes and getting their blackmail money through litterbins again.

    1 2 Reply
    1. LaeMing
      Reply Icon
      Boffin

      Re: Sell your Bitcoins NOW!

      They are only valuable because enough people agree that they are.

      Then again, that applies to traditional currencies as well.

      And various metals, shiny rocks, artworks, etc. too.

      2 0 Reply
  8. Colin Tree

    none of their bloody business

    If it's money laundering from crime, they don't mind to make a loss. Throwing dirty money on roulette, 1/2 red, 1/2 black, guaranteed get back nearly 50%, never loose, but comes back clean.

    The value of Bitcoin is going up because of investors/opportunists.

    Traditional currencies only go down because of inflation.

    $$$ to buy a house 20 years ago would only buy you a shithouse today.

    I would rather use a currency which is stable, "what goes up must come down" Newton

    (ii) is not issued by or under the authority of a government body = none of their bloody business

    0 0 Reply

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