Governments around the world are expressing their concerns about digital currencies. The talks are aimed towards regulations. Central Banks are continuously expressing interest in CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency). From my perspective the only way governments can hope to enforce regulations is through continued compliance. The state of Texas has informed banks within Texas that they may custody crypto currencies under current law. This is how I see a possibility for governments to attempt to gain control by allowing main stream financial institutions to custody crypto currencies. There are concerns around consumers being exposed to the extreme fluctuations of many crypto currencies. That is one concern expressed by US lawmakers. That said lawmakers are giving stable coins attention form a different approach. The views of lawmakers on stable coins has not been made clear yet.
There has been some debate over who has the most to gain from digital assets, criminals or investors. Well since no governmental body has ever launched a war on cash it seems to be an oxymoron not to stand behind crypto currencies. Yes there are crypto currencies built around untraceable transactions. Yet a digital foot print and a paper trail are truly the same. With digital assets you can still follow the trail. Accounts my just be numbers, that isn't so different from accounts in countries that cater to anonymous security of wealth. Not everyone that would like to keep their financial trans actions private is a criminal. Back to the point crypto is somewhat easier to follow. Through mainstream custody of crypto currencies you gain end to end opportunities to circumvent the anonymous transactions. That is how the deep web later known as the dark web now more commonly referred to as the open web invented for sending untraceable information for military communications was over powered to bring down criminal organizations exploiting that network.
In summary all they have to do is watch the value flow. Crypto currencies that are often demonized by early adoption for criminal activity are indeed traceable. More so than other forms of exchange like diamonds, precious metals, and especially cash. You don't need teams of armed agents in public playing cat and mouse games with criminals. You only need a cyber analyst with some clever software to see where unregulated transactions are surfacing.