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Australian regulators have identified crypto and cash as the highest-risk financial crime vectors for 2025–26
AUSTRAC is focusing its efforts on activities that can move money offshore quickly and opaquely
The agency has sharpened its focus on sector-wide risks and enhanced its intelligence capabilities

In response to rising concerns over digital assets and cash, AUSTRAC has declared cryptocurrency and cash-based transactions as the most significant financial crime risk for the 2025–26 year. The agency has also ramped up efforts to regulate roughly 80,000 new businesses across sectors such as real estate, law, accounting, precious metals and stones. The agency has already stepped up its efforts to curb illegal use of Bitcoin ATMs in its fight against criminal use of digital assets, but now it is taking things one step further.

Crypto and Cash Under Scrutiny

AUSTRAC revealed its new targets through a press release issued yesterday, where CEO Brendan Thomas stated that the agency is embarking on “the most ambitious overhaul of Australia’s anti-money laundering laws in a generation.” In the press release, Thomas called cryptocurrencies a “high-risk” sector and noted their potential to aid criminal activity:

We are also focusing efforts where the risk of harm is greatest, for example in digital currencies, which allow funds to move across borders quickly, cheaply and virtually anonymously.

Thomas added that cash, too, was still “highly susceptible to money laundering” due to the fact that, unlike cryptocurrencies, it is “anonymous, accessible and widely accepted.”

Tranche 2 Brings New Players

From July 2026, roughly 80,000 new businesses, including real estate agents, lawyers, and dealers in precious metals and stones, will fall under AML/CTF regulations, with Thomas noting the “regulatory shift” taking place, moving from regulation that “primarily checks for compliance” to one focused on “substantive risks and harms.”

AUSTRAC has already taken steps to clamp down on some elements of crypto misuse by stepping up enforcement against cryptocurrency ATM operators. The agency uncovered widespread misuse of the machines in scams and other illegal schemes and imposed stricter operating conditions as a result, including tighter transaction limits and enhanced due diligence.

The post Australia Flags Crypto as Top Financial Crime Threat appeared first on FullyCrypto.

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Filed under: Bitcoin - @ July 19, 2025 4:24 am