Businesses forced to adapt to new changes.
Photo: MKC

The cashless society moves forward.

CASH LIMIT FOR BUSINESSES

New ‘anti-money laundering’ rules are set to restrict large cash transactions across the European Union, with businesses and professional service providers facing a common EU-wide maximum cash-payment threshold of €10,000.

The European Union is set to introduce this limit large cash payments from 10 July 2027, under Regulation (EU) 2024/1624 – a key component of the bloc’s supposed efforts to ‘combat money laundering and terrorist financing’.

The regulation applies to transactions “involving goods or services carried out in a professional capacity”, and is intended to “make large financial transactions more transparent and reduce opportunities for illicit funds to enter the legitimate economy”.

Under Article 80 of the regulation, businesses and professionals will generally be prohibited from making or accepting cash payments of €10,000 within this context.

The restriction applies to both sides of a transaction, which they say is designed to ‘prevent large cash payments from being used to conceal the movement of money’.

The rules also address attempts to circumvent the limit by dividing a large payment into smaller instalments. Several payments that appear to be linked may be treated as part of the same transaction, meaning that splitting a purchase will not avoid the restriction.

For example, a customer purchasing a vehicle from a dealership for €15,000 will generally be unable to pay the entire amount in cash, even if it is split. Alternative methods, such as a bank transfer or card payment, would need to be used instead.

The cashless society model takes yet another leap forward.

The regulation establishes a common ceiling for large professional transactions, while also applying to token digital coins. For example, crypto platforms must delist privacy coins like Monero, Zcash, and Dash under the new rules.

Although the €10,000 threshold establishes a common EU-wide standard, individual member states can maintain or introduce lower limits on cash payments.

This means the rules will not necessarily operate identically in every country.

Consumers and businesses will need to consider their national legislation, as a transaction permitted under the EU-wide threshold could still breach a stricter domestic restriction. What a mess that could turn out to be.

This is quite a significant blow to the freedom of businesses to operate on a true cash flow basis, now relying solely on digital numbers on a screen, and tap-and-go hoaxery.

One interesting exception found in the regulations concerns certain payments made on the premises of credit institutions, payment institutions, and electronic money institutions, allowing them to not be subject to the conditions set out in Article 80.

Of course not. The banks and financial institutions are ‘business as usual’.

For the rest, the changes may require updated payment procedures and greater attention to transaction records and compliance obligations. Consumers making high-value purchases may increasingly need to rely on electronic payment methods, too.

You can see where this is all headed, folks – and it is finally arriving overseas.

The change marks a significant step towards ‘harmonising’ restrictions on large cash payments across the bloc – something that is coming for the rest of the world.

The cash-payment limit forms part of the EU’s broader reform of its ‘anti-money laundering’ and ‘counter-terrorist financing’ frameworks.

Just like we are focusing on here in Australia.

Don’t forget that in July, Australia introduced sweeping ‘anti-money laundering’ reforms that significantly broaden the range of businesses required to ‘detect and report suspicious financial activity’. In other words, they now need to police their customers.

Australia expands ‘anti-money laundering’ laws to more businesses
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These obligations include enrolling with AUSTRAC, conducting ‘customer due diligence’, verifying client identities, assessing money laundering and ‘terrorism financing’ risks, maintaining internal compliance programmes, monitoring transactions, reporting ‘suspicious matters’, and retaining prescribed records.

They have also tried to ban cash payments above $10,000 here in Australia, too – although that push thankfully failed to pass as law.