Dealers say art sales have fallen because of Mexico’s new anti-money-laundering law. It requires buyers’ personal information be reported.
The anti-money-laundering law, passed in 2012, has two core objectives: limiting the use of cash and requiring businesses to give more information to the government about their customers. The rules apply to a wide range of “vulnerable” industries that presumably are attractive destinations for ill-gotten gains: casinos, pawnshops, jewelry stores, armored-car dealerships and art galleries.
More broadly, what makes the new rules disruptive is that they point toward an ambitious and difficult social change: In Mexico, despite its hyper-developed pockets, vast portions of the population still reside in the informal economy, the cash-based world of unlicensed vendors, undeclared income, unpaid taxes. The reform goes against that grain and also requires businesses and their customers to share information with a government often distrusted by its own people.
(Dominic Bracco II/Prime for The Washington Post)
