AK HB271

Establishes comprehensive licensing requirements for money transmission and currency exchange businesses, including application procedures, fingerprinting, credit checks, and registration through the Nationwide Multistate Licensing System and Registry.

Requires surety bonds between $25,000 and $1,000,000 for licensees, with bonds covering claims for at least five years after a licensee stops providing money services in the state.

Expands the definition of "money transmission" to include virtual currency activities such as receiving, transmitting, securing, storing, buying, selling, and performing retail conversion services for virtual currencies.

Authorizes money services licensees to contract with other licensees to use their authorized delegates as subdelegates for reloading funds on stored-value cards, with subdelegates added to the delegate roster if they sell new cards.

Increases record retention requirements from three to five years and modifies application timelines, changing automatic approval after 120 days to requiring explicit department approval within that timeframe; effective July 1, 2016.