The Argentine Congress reformed the legal framework on concealment and laundering of assets from criminal sources and included virtual assets and their providers under scrutiny.

The reform defined the concept of virtual assets, virtual asset services and stipulated their registration in the country in order to prevent their use in money laundering related activities. The registration is required for providing services in the country.

Virtual assets were broadly defined as a digital representation of value that can be traded and/or transferred digitally and used for payments or investments. In no case shall virtual assets be understood as legal tender in the national territory and currencies issued by other countries or jurisdictions (fiat currency).

Under the new regulation, Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) are all those, human or legal persons, who carry out as a business one or more of the following activities or operations for or on behalf of another human or legal person:

1. Exchange between virtual assets and legal tender (fiat currencies);
2. Exchange between one or more forms of virtual assets;
3. Transfer of virtual assets;
4. Custody and/or administration of virtual assets or instruments enabling control over virtual assets; and,
5. Participation in and provision of financial services related to the offering of an issuer and/or sale of a virtual asset.

PSVAs (resident or incorporated in Argentina; or resident or incorporated outside Argentina) are all individuals and legal entities that use websites, social networks or other media, directing their offer and/or advertising to persons resident in the Argentine Republic. PSVAs may have operations in the country or use any type of technology to receive funds locally from residents in the country.

PSVAs with a volume of operations superior to 35,000 Purchase Value Units (PVU) per calendar month (approximately US$31,000) must register with the Registry of Virtual Asset Service Providers (the "Registry"). For the purpose of the determination of this amount, the value of the PVU corresponding to the last day of such month must be applied to the totality of the activities or operations registered in the calendar month.

It shall be understood that a human or legal person resident or incorporated outside Argentina carries out in the country any of such activities or operations when they are carried out under any of the modalities mentioned below:

1. That they use any ".ar" domain to carry out their activities or operations.
2. That they have commercial agreements with third parties or subsidiaries or related parties that allow them to receive locally funds or assets from Argentine residents for the performance of the activities or operations (or any similar activity of those known as ramp services).
3. That they have a clear targeting of residents of the Argentine Republic.
4. That they clearly advertise to residents of the Argentine Republic.
5. That their turnover in the Argentine Republic exceeds 20% of their total turnover. For this purpose, only the total turnover of the activity or activities for which they are to be entered in the Registry shall be considered.

Persons, human or legal, domiciled, incorporated, or residing in domains, jurisdictions, territories or associated States that are included in the list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax transparency purposes, and those considered non-cooperative or high risk by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), may not be included in the Register.

The registration must be requested within 45 days of the entry into force of the Resolution on 3 June 2024.

Further, the PSVAs were included in the list of regulated entities under the Money Laundering Prevention Regime. In summary, they must comply with the following main obligations:

1. Register with the Financial Information Unit (FIU).
2. Collect documentation from clients and identify and verify the authenticity of beneficial owners.
3. Report suspicious activities related to illicit activities such as money laundering, financing of terrorism or proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
4. Refrain from disclosing to the customer or third parties the actions being carried out in compliance with these regulations.
5. Create internal prevention procedures.
6. Designate compliance officers responsible to the FIU to ensure compliance with the obligations established by law.
7. Obtain information on the customer relationship: Determine the purpose and nature of the relationship established with the customer.
8. Assess and mitigate risks.
9. Continuously review the transactions carried out.
10. Identify persons with management and representative functions for their customers.
11. Mitigate risks in relationships without the physical presence of the customer.
12. Manage risks of politically exposed persons.
13. Determine the origin and legality of funds involved in the transactions.
14. Maintain physical or digital records of all transactions for at least ten years, as well as documentation related to customer identification and business correspondence.
15. Pre-commencement compliance: Failure to comply with certain obligations precludes the initiation or continuation of the customer relationship, subject to further analysis to determine whether a suspicious transaction should be reported to the FIU.

These rules were issued to ensure compliance with the standards set out in FATF Recommendation 15, and to avoid being placed on the "grey list" of countries vulnerable to financial crime and money laundering