Ireland has introduced its first national anti-money laundering strategy through 2030, placing enhanced checks on private-wallet transfers and overseas crypto firms among its main digital-asset controls. According to reports from the Department of Finance, the national AML strategy will coordinate the country's response to money laundering, terrorist financing, and proliferation financing until 2030. Finance Minister Simon Harris stated that criminal organizations exploit new technologies, crypto assets, and complex international financial networks to conceal profits, emphasizing that the strategy demonstrates Ireland will not be a haven for money laundering. The plan completes Ireland's implementation of the remaining provisions under the European Union's Transfer of Funds Regulation, requiring crypto-asset service providers to conduct enhanced checks on transfers involving self-hosted wallets and apply stricter due diligence when working with crypto businesses based outside the EU.
Under the regulation, information about a transfer's originator and beneficiary must accompany the transaction when a regulated provider is involved. Required details can include names, distributed-ledger addresses, crypto account numbers, and unique transaction identifiers. For transfers exceeding €1,000, the firm must take steps to assess whether its customer owns or controls the self-hosted address. A receiving provider must also establish procedures for detecting missing or incomplete information, with the ability to request further details, suspend the transfer, return the assets, or reject the transaction depending on the risk assessment. The central mechanism is the FATF travel rule, which requires each transaction to be accompanied by information on its origin and the beneficiary, ensuring comprehensive tracking of digital asset movements. The new strategy specifically targets self-custodied wallets—those not held by an exchange or custodian—which have been harder to trace in the current framework.
Ireland's implementation falls alongside the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation, which established a common licensing system for crypto-asset service providers across the EU. According to the European Securities and Markets Authority, Ireland selected a 12-month grandfathering period that ended on December 30, 2025, requiring existing firms to secure full MiCA authorization or stop offering regulated services in Ireland before the last EU transition periods ended in July 2026. Licensed companies can now use MiCA authorization issued in one member state to provide covered services across the bloc, subject to the regulation's passporting process. MiCA entered fully into force on July 1, and Brussels is preparing a review of the regulatory framework for 2027 that seeks to incorporate non-European stablecoin issuers.
A 30-point implementation plan released with the June assessment assigned another crypto measure to the Gambling Regulatory Authority of Ireland. By the second quarter of 2027, the authority must establish an industry standard for accepting crypto-related activity as a source of funds, with due diligence procedures for checking whether money linked to digital assets comes from a legitimate source. The scheduled standard will form part of the authority's checks on customer funds and financial-crime exposure, addressing the point where crypto proceeds enter regulated gambling services rather than prohibiting gamblers from owning digital assets. The most significant domestic measure in the plan tasked the Gambling Regulatory Authority of Ireland with developing a sectoral standard for accepting crypto assets as a source of funds, with due diligence to verify their legitimacy.
At the European bloc level, the AML Regulation prohibits crypto service providers from offering or maintaining anonymous accounts or those that allow transactions to be anonymized, including privacy coins. However, the European Union has announced plans to ban crypto service providers from offering or holding anonymous accounts starting in July 2027, though self-custodied wallets will be excluded from this ban, meaning individuals can still hold their own crypto without undergoing third-party verification. This exemption has been a point of contention among regulators, who worry about the potential for misuse, but it reflects a balance between privacy and security concerns. The rules take effect in July 2027 and will be overseen by the Anti-Money Laundering Authority headquartered in Frankfurt. Enforcement has already reached large service providers operating in the country, with the Central Bank fining Coinbase Europe about €21.5 million in November 2025 over failures connected to its transaction-monitoring system. The government's latest strategy follows a June risk assessment that classified crypto assets as a "very significant" money laundering and terrorist-financing risk, with Central Bank of Ireland data showing about 10% of the population had invested in crypto as of December.
