Money laundering and terror financing are biggest risks posed by crypto: Finance minister

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman

Biggest risk of cryptocurrency could be money laundering and its use for financing terror, said Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday.

"I think regulation using technology is the only answer. Regulation using technology will have to be so adept, that it has to be not behind the curve, but be sure that it is on top of it. And that's not possible if any one country thinks that it can handle it. It has to be across the board," the minister said.

Sitharaman underscored India's digital performance and the Centre's efforts to build the digital infrastructure framework over the last decade, highlighting the increase of the digital adoption rate during the pandemic.

"If I use 2019 data, the digital adoption rate in India is about 85 percent. But globally that same year it was only somewhere near 64 percent. So the pandemic time actually helped us to test and prove for ourselves that it is simple to use, common people can use it, and adoption actually was proven," Sitharaman asserted.

Apart from her official engagements with the World Bank, IMF, G20, and Financial Action Task Force, Sitharaman on Monday attended an event at the Atlantic Council, a think tank based in Washington DC.

Sitharaman will head to San Francisco on April 24 to engage with business leaders and interact with faculty and students at Stanford University. She will depart for India on April 27.