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On The Brink with Castle Island


Aug 26, 2020

Zachary Kelman, managing partner at Kelman Law PLLC, joins the show to shed light on the FATF – it's origins and its current mandate – the travel rule, and what the industry can expect from these developments. Covered in this episode:

  • Zach's prior career in bank compliance and how he decided to focus on Bitcoin
  • How Zach noticed the blurring of lines between stopping crime and politics for bank AML
  • Why overseas payments in the correspondent bank system are expensive
  • What the Travel Rule actually means
  • Why Zach thinks Bitcoin compares favorably with the default correspondent banking system
  • Why banks freeze out certain sectors even without a specific ban or prohibition
  • How Coins.ph moved the needle for financial inclusion in the Philippines
  • The history of the FATF and its original mandate and intent
  • Why the FATF's recommendation could possibly bifurcate the bitcoin market
  • How the end of the Cold War might have influenced the creation of the FATF
  • What Fukuyama's End of History has to do with financial crimes enforcement
  • Will the decline of the US-led international order mean organizations like the FATF will have a reduced ability to police global finance
  • Zach's thesis that western Europe might end up being a haven for the crypto industry
  • How the FATF recommendations actually get enforced at the local level
  • How the FATF black and graylists change bank behavior
  • Why NYDFS has so much control over global finance
  • How bank behavior in the US is often more norm based than couched in law
  • Why a rise of nationalism could advantage Bitcoin