The encirclement of global financial regulation is tightening. The European Union recently officially approved the Anti-Money Laundering Regulation, requiring all crypto service providers to verify customer identities starting from 2027. This may seem like a routine regulatory measure, but for the privacy coin ecosystem, it is nothing less than a death knell.

Take Monero (XMR) for example—its entire design logic is to make transactions completely untraceable. Ring signatures, stealth addresses, confidential transactions—these three layers of privacy protection were once hailed as "the crown of privacy technology." But now? This very technology has become its fatal flaw in the compliance world.

Imagine a world where all windows must be transparent and subject to inspection, yet you build a completely sealed fortress. This is the awkward reality faced by XMR and other privacy coins today.

Since 2023, major exchanges have begun to gradually restrict privacy coin trading in Europe. This is not just a cyclical policy fluctuation but a systemic effort to purge such assets from the entire financial system. No jurisdiction’s regulatory authority would allow funds to flow completely invisibly—that would threaten financial security and anti-money laundering systems.

This war is essentially a losing battle for privacy coins. Because the very feature they pride themselves on—the untraceability of transactions—is precisely what regulators must eradicate. No matter how advanced the technology, it is just an obstacle in the face of regulation. The wave of delisting privacy coins has only just begun, and the likely story ahead is more and more exchanges and payment platforms saying goodbye.