The Trump Administration has been under fire since its inauguration. One of the most controversial figures is the the United States’s Treasury Secretary, Mr. Steve Mnuchin. Recently, Mnuchin made some interesting comments about cryptocurrencies and VanEck official pointed out a rather amusing phenomenon.
Mr. Mnuchin seems to support the cryptocurrency critics stating that Bitcoin and alt coins will be subject to essentially the same level of scrutiny and jurisdiction as fiat money.
Mnuchin also said that fiat money is not used for criminal activities, as they have the “strongest AML systems” to prevent such activities from happening. Here is his full comment:
I don’t think fiat currency has been successfully used as a tool by bad actors. We have one of the strongest AML systems in the world and are working to ensure that illegal activities do not occur.
However, the problem in this statement? The United States’s Treasury Secretary is going against the Treasury’s report on how fiat money is used for criminal activities. The report states the following:
Criminal actors involved in drug trafficking, human smuggling and trafficking, illicit retail transactions, and various activities associate with organized crime continue to prefer US currency-denominated cash due to its widespread use in the US as well as its global use due its wide acceptance as a stable store of value and medium of exchange.
In addition, Mr. Mnuchin attacked Bitcoin to suggest that the “people’s currency” is being exploited for illicit activities such as tax evasion, human trafficking, extortion, etc. Finally, he stated that the threat of such illicit activities bolstered by digital coins is a matter of national security.
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