Crypto Exchange Huobi to Delist 7 Privacy Coins, Including Zcash, Monero

Prominent crypto exchange Huobi Global will delist seven privacy tokens next week amid broader regulatory scrutiny of such tokens, it said in a statement on Monday.

“Huobi Global strictly complies with the compliance policies of every country and region and always endeavors to safeguard our users' assets,” the exchange, which is one of the largest in world, said.

Both spot and futures trading of the tokens – dash (DASH), decred (DCR), firo (FIRO), monero (XMR), verge (XVG), zcash (ZEC) and horizen (ZEN) – was paused last Tuesday. The delisting of these tokens is scheduled to start at 08:00 UTC on Sept 19.

The deposit service for DASH, DCR, FIRO, XMR, XVG, ZEC and ZEN will cease at 08:00 (UTC), on Monday, but the withdrawal service continues to function, Huobi said.

Huobi said the move was “in compliance with the latest financial regulations.”

Representatives from Huobi didn't immediately respond to requests for additional comment.

Privacy coins are cryptocurrencies that preserve anonymity by obscuring the flow of money across their networks. They make it difficult to work out who sent what to whom – which is useful if you don’t want anyone snooping on your financial activity.

On Aug. 8, the U.S. Treasury Department barred customers in the U.S. from using Tornado Cash, a decentralized mixer program that enables private transactions on the Ethereum blockchain, sparking questions around privacy protocols and privacy coins generally and causing increased scrutiny on such tokens.

A gauge for privacy tokens showed the sector lost 0.42% in the past 24 hours even as broader crypto markets gained on Monday.