Dave Jevans, CEO of CipherTrace, and Siân Jones, Senior Partner at XReg Consulting, give the lowdown on the Financial Action Task Force’s travel rule and how it applies to businesses in the crypto space. They discuss:

their background and journey into crypto
what the travel rule is
the consequences for countries that are not compliant
whether the regulation will apply to staking providers in the future
the type of companies and transactions that will be covered under the travel rule
the type of information that has to be provided
how banks comply with the travel rule and whether crypto companies can use the same system
the different open standards available for sharing information
how the information will get shared between entities who use different travel rule solution providers
the “sunrise problem” in which different companies implement their compliance systems at different times
the security of user data being shared between different entities
how it applies to central bank digital currencies and centralized stablecoins
how the rule would affect privacy coins
the inherent contradiction between the cypherpunk philosophy and regulatory compliance
unintended consequences of the travel rule
how the travel rule may play out in the coming years

A glossary of terms discussed in the episode:

FATF: Financial Action Task Force, an intergovernmental organization that develops policies to combat money laundering and terrorist financing

VASP: virtual asset service providers, who are custodial entities that run fiat-to-crypto or crypto-to-crypto exchanges, or run businesses related to transfer and safekeeping of virtual assets and financial services.

FinCEN: Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, the United States federal bureau that analyzes information about financial transactions in order to fight money laundering, terrorist financing, and other financial crimes