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Accepting Cryptocurrency Payments in Business: Contracts, Tax, AML
This article is about what a company needs to do to accept payment in cryptocurrency. It covers the two ways of accepting payment, contract terms with the customer and with the payment provider, tax in the EU, the UK and the US, and anti-money laundering (AML) and sanctions requirements. Everything is based on primary sources:…
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Responsible Gambling and AML for iGaming Operators: Mandatory Procedures
An online gambling operator answers to the regulator on two fronts. The first is protection against money laundering, known as AML. The second is responsible gambling, which means protecting the players themselves. This article covers the procedures that are mandatory on each front in the EU, the UK, Malta, Curaçao and Estonia, where the two…
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Merchant Agreements: Clauses That Protect an Acquirer or PSP from Transaction Laundering
What Visa and Mastercard require in a merchant agreement and which extra clauses close the gap against transaction laundering: no payments for third parties, a register of sites, suspension of payouts, termination and recovery of fines.
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Illegal Gambling Through Other Businesses’ Card Payments: How the Scheme Works and Who Is Liable
Illegal gambling businesses rarely accept payments under their own name. More often players’ card payments pass through someone else’s ordinary-looking business, and that is exactly what card schemes and banks hold acquirers and payment companies to account for. We go through, according to primary sources, how such a scheme works, what Visa and Mastercard require,…
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Payment Facilitators, Aggregators and ISOs: Who Is Responsible for Sub-Merchants
A payment company onboards many small sellers under one agreement with a bank. If one of them breaks the rules, it is not only the seller who answers. We explain in plain words how a PayFac (also known as a payment aggregator), an ISO and a marketplace differ, who is responsible to Visa and Mastercard…
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KYC and KYB for Payment Providers: Building a Risk-Based Customer Due Diligence Programme
Know your customer (KYC) and know your business (KYB) are the checks a payment company runs on its clients before and during the relationship. Banks, card schemes and supervisors judge you by how well you do them. From 10 July 2027 one EU regulation, the Anti-Money Laundering Regulation (AMLR), replaces the different national rules. This…