Request for Administrative Ruling on the Application of FinCEN’s Regulations to a Virtual Currency Trading Platform Summary
Updated 12/27/2021
This tool summarizes FinCEN’s ruling regarding a company that will set up a trading system platform. Customers will fund their own account with legal tender and place orders for virtual currency with the company. The company will then attempt to match the customer with a seller of virtual currency. The following are the key takeaways of the ruling:
1. As part of the analysis of whether a person is a money services business (MSB), you must identify the role the person is playing: (1) exchanger, (2) administrator; or (3) user.
2. FinCEN’s guidance issued on a product or service under a specific set of facts and circumstances may only be relied upon when another product or service shares the same set of facts and circumstances.
3. Conditionality of an exchange does not disqualify it from being considered “money transmission.”
4. A person that accepts currency or convertible virtual currency (CVC), with the intent and/or effect of transmitting currency or CVC to another person or location if a certain predetermined condition established by the transmitter is met, is a money transmitter under FinCEN’s regulations.
5. The method of funding a transaction is immaterial to the definition of money transmitter.
Members Can Download This Tool
Login to Download
Not Yet a Member?
Our members enjoy:
On-demand regulatory guidance hotline – by chat, phone and email – available from anywhere, on any device – 7 am - 6 pm, M-F, Central time
Research time saved daily & weekly across forms, checklists, and trainings — for every regulation
Hours of form-building and branding of bank documents saved; in some cases, even the budget of additional staff
A sounding board for support and reassessment when institutional goals or the regulatory environment changes
Access to attorneys and compliance specialists for risk modelling and decision-making in advance of large business decisions
The knowledge that C/A was created and owned by 30 State Bankers Association to provide bank compliance services to their membership organizations
Find out how a personalized team of attorneys and compliance professionals helps build targeted compliance strategies throughout your institution when you take our Live Membership Demo.