This Regulation lays down rules on the information on payers and payees accompanying transfers of funds, in any currency, and on the information on originators and beneficiaries accompanying transfers of crypto-assets, for the purposes of preventing, detecting and investigating money laundering and terrorist financing, where at least one of the payment service providers or crypto-asset service providers involved in the transfer of funds or transfer of crypto-assets is established or has its registered office, as applicable, in the Union. In addition, this Regulation lays down rules on internal policies, procedures and controls to ensure implementation of restrictive measures where at least one of the payment service providers or crypto-asset service providers involved in the transfer of funds or transfer of crypto-assets is established or has its registered office, as applicable, in the Union.
1. This Regulation shall apply to transfers of funds, in any currency, which are sent or received by a payment service provider or an intermediary payment service provider established in the Union. It shall also apply to transfers of crypto-assets, including transfers of crypto-assets executed by means of crypto-ATMs, where the crypto-asset service provider, or the intermediary crypto-asset service provider, of either the originator or the beneficiary has its registered office in the Union.
2. This Regulation shall not apply to the services listed in Article 3, points (a) to (m) and point (o), of Directive (EU) 2015/2366.
3. This Regulation shall not apply to transfers of funds or to transfers of electronic money tokens, as defined in Article 3(1), point (7), of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114, carried out using a payment card, an electronic money instrument, a mobile phone or any other digital or IT prepaid or postpaid device with similar characteristics, provided that the following conditions are met:
(a)
that card, instrument or device is used exclusively to pay for goods or services; and
(b)
the number of that card, instrument or device accompanies all transfers flowing from the transaction.
However, this Regulation shall apply when a payment card, an electronic money instrument, a mobile phone or any other digital or IT prepaid or postpaid device with similar characteristics is used in order to effect a transfer of funds or electronic money tokens between natural persons acting as consumers for purposes other than trade, business or professional activity.
4. This Regulation shall not apply to persons that have no activity other than to convert paper documents into electronic data and that do so pursuant to a contract with a payment service provider, or to persons that have no activity other than to provide payment service providers with messaging or other support systems for transmitting funds or with clearing and settlement systems.
This Regulation shall not apply to a transfer of funds where any of the following conditions is met:
(a)
it involves the payer withdrawing cash from the payer’s own payment account;
(b)
it constitutes a transfer of funds to a public authority as payment for taxes, fines or other levies within a Member State;
(c)
both the payer and the payee are payment service providers acting on their own behalf;
(d)
it is carried out through cheque images exchanges, including truncated cheques.
This Regulation shall not apply to a transfer of crypto-assets where any of the following conditions is met:
(a)
both the originator and the beneficiary are crypto-asset service providers acting on their own behalf;
(b)
the transfer constitutes a person-to-person transfer of crypto-assets carried out without the involvement of a crypto-asset service provider.
Electronic money tokens, as defined in Article 3(1), point (7), of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114, shall be treated as crypto-assets under this Regulation.
5. A Member State may decide not to apply this Regulation to transfers of funds within its territory to a payee’s payment account permitting payment exclusively for the provision of goods or services where all of the following conditions are met:
(a)
the payment service provider of the payee is subject to Directive (EU) 2015/849;
(b)
the payment service provider of the payee is able to trace back, through the payee, by means of a unique transaction identifier, the transfer of funds from the person who has an agreement with the payee for the provision of goods or services;
(c)
the amount of the transfer of funds does not exceed EUR 1 000.
For the purposes of this Regulation, the following definitions apply:
(1)
‘terrorist financing’ means terrorist financing as defined in Article 1(5) of Directive (EU) 2015/849;
(2)
‘money laundering’ means the money laundering activities referred to in Article 1(3) and (4) of Directive (EU) 2015/849;
(3)
‘payer’ means a person that holds a payment account and allows a transfer of funds from that payment account or, where there is no payment account, that gives a transfer of funds order;
(4)
‘payee’ means a person that is the intended recipient of the transfer of funds;
(5)
‘payment service provider’ means the categories of payment service provider referred to in Article 1(1) of Directive (EU) 2015/2366, natural or legal persons benefiting from a waiver pursuant to Article 32 thereof and legal persons benefiting from a waiver pursuant to Article 9 of Directive 2009/110/EC, providing transfer of funds services;
(6)
‘intermediary payment service provider’ means a payment service provider that is not the payment service provider of the payer or of the payee and that receives and transmits a transfer of funds on behalf of the payment service provider of the payer or of the payee or of another intermediary payment service provider;
(7)
‘payment account’ means a payment account as defined in Article 4, point (12), of Directive (EU) 2015/2366;
(8)
‘funds’ means funds as defined in Article 4, point (25), of Directive (EU) 2015/2366;
(9)
‘transfer of funds’ means any transaction at least partially carried out by electronic means on behalf of a payer through a payment service provider, with a view to making funds available to a payee through a payment service provider, irrespective of whether the payer and the payee are the same person and irrespective of whether the payment service provider of the payer and that of the payee are one and the same, including:
(a)
a credit transfer as defined in Article 4, point (24), of Directive (EU) 2015/2366;
(b)
a direct debit as defined in Article 4, point (23), of Directive (EU) 2015/2366;
(c)
a money remittance as defined in Article 4, point (22), of Directive (EU) 2015/2366, whether national or cross-border;
(d)
a transfer carried out using a payment card, an electronic money instrument, a mobile phone or any other digital or IT prepaid or postpaid device with similar characteristics;
(10)
‘transfer of crypto-assets’ means any transaction with the aim of moving crypto-assets from one distributed ledger address, crypto-asset account or other device allowing the storage of crypto-assets to another, carried out by at least one crypto-asset service provider acting on behalf of either an originator or a beneficiary, irrespective of whether the originator and the beneficiary are the same person and irrespective of whether the crypto-asset service provider of the originator and that of the beneficiary are one and the same;
(11)
‘batch file transfer’ means a bundle of several individual transfers of funds or transfers of crypto-assets put together for transmission;
(12)
‘unique transaction identifier’ means a combination of letters, numbers or symbols determined by the payment service provider, in accordance with the protocols of the payment and settlement systems or messaging systems used for the transfer of funds, or determined by a crypto-asset service provider, which permits the traceability of the transaction back to the payer and the payee or the traceability of the transfer of crypto-assets back to the originator and the beneficiary;
(13)
‘person-to-person transfer of crypto-assets’ means a transfer of crypto-assets without the involvement of any crypto-asset service provider;
(14)
‘crypto-asset’ means a crypto-asset as defined in Article 3(1), point (5), of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114, except where falling within the categories listed in Article 2(2), (3) and (4) of that Regulation or otherwise qualifying as funds;
(15)
‘crypto-asset service provider’ means a crypto-asset service provider as defined in Article 3(1), point (15), of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114, where performing one or more crypto-asset services as defined in Article 3(1), point (16), of that Regulation;
(16)
‘intermediary crypto-asset service provider’ means a crypto-asset service provider that is not the crypto-asset service provider of the originator or of the beneficiary and that receives and transmits a transfer of crypto-assets on behalf of the crypto-asset service provider of the originator or of the beneficiary, or of another intermediary crypto-asset service provider;
(17)
‘crypto-asset automated teller machines’ or ‘crypto-ATMs’ means physical or on-line electronic terminals that enable a crypto-asset service provider to perform, in particular, the activity of transfer services for crypto-assets, as referred to in Article 3(1), point (16)(j), of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114;
(18)
‘distributed ledger address’ means an alphanumeric code that identifies an address on a network using distributed ledger technology (DLT) or similar technology where crypto-assets can be sent or received;
(19)
‘crypto-asset account’ means an account held by a crypto-asset service provider in the name of one or more natural or legal persons and that can be used for the execution of transfers of crypto-assets;
(20)
‘self-hosted address’ means a distributed ledger address not linked to either of the following:
(a)
a crypto-asset service provider;
(b)
an entity not established in the Union and providing services similar to those of a crypto-asset service provider;
(21)
‘originator’ means a person that holds a crypto-asset account with a crypto-asset service provider, a distributed ledger address or a device allowing the storage of crypto-assets, and allows a transfer of crypto-assets from that account, distributed ledger address, or device, or, where there is no such account, distributed ledger address, or device, a person that orders or initiates a transfer of crypto-assets;
(22)
‘beneficiary’ means a person that is the intended recipient of the transfer of crypto-assets;
(23)
‘legal entity identifier’ or ‘LEI’ means a unique alphanumeric reference code based on the ISO 17442 standard assigned to a legal entity;
(24)
‘distributed ledger technology’ or ‘DLT’ means distributed ledger technology as defined in Article 3(1), point (1), of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114.
