BB instructs banks to tighten monitoring of cryptocurrency transactions
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Bangladesh Bank has once again directed authorities to monitor cryptocurrency transactions after finding that people are still using bank accounts for the buying and selling of Bitcoin and other virtual currencies, bdnews24.com reports.
The central bank issued a circular on the matter and sent it out to the managing directors of all banks on Wednesday.
The national bank had recently noticed that different foreign Virtual Asset Service Providers or VASPs are carrying out “transactions, buying and selling, re-selling, p2p/exchange/relocate/trade activities” of virtual currencies using customer accounts of scheduled banks through their websites and apps, the circular read.
Bangladesh Bank instructed all financial service providers to “increase monitoring maintaining proper caution” to prevent such activities.
Bangladesh Bank also asked authorities to display a message on the prohibition at its headquarters, branches, sub-branches, agent banking outlets and on its website.
The central bank had previously cautioned the banks about the risks associated with dealing with cryptocurrencies.
In a circular released in September, it said: “Virtual currencies or virtual assets have no financial claim embedded and neither issued by any sovereign nor guaranteed by any jurisdiction. Thus, their value is highly volatile and associated with high financial risks.”
“The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has defined virtual assets as a digital representation of value that can be digitally traded, or transferred, and can be used for payment or investment purposes,” it added.
“Any transactions made in/from/to Bangladesh for obtaining virtual assets or its subset virtual currencies, are not permitted by Bangladesh Bank. And neither is providing any kind of facilitation in favour of doing business, activities, and operations associated with exchange/transfer/trading of virtual assets or virtual currencies.”