As adoption takes off, the crypto industry is exerting increasing influence on American society. This can be seen in its lobbying efforts and political action committees, for example, as well as its own organizational efforts, such as forming business associations that promote crypto at the state, regional and national levels. Yet another way crypto is influencing society is through self-regulation. The broader impact of self-regulation may be less apparent than when a PAC finances a political campaign or a startup is nurtured in a crypto industry-sponsored accelerator, and that limited visibility probably reflects the extent of the influence of self-regulatory …

The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, or CFTC, has released its Fiscal Year 2023 (FY2023) budget request, seeking $365 million. This marks a 9.9% increase over the previous year and 20% over FY2021. The commission regulates the country’s derivatives market and has been increasingly active in recent years in policing financial products that incorporate cryptocurrencies. According to the agency’s request document, the CTFC focuses on digital asset custodian risk, ensuring secure storage, as well as on accounting. The agency has its own staff of certified public due to the lack of guidance on digital asset accounting from sectoral oversight bodies. …

Several storylines that had been long in the making dominated last week’s news cycle in the cryptocurrency policy and enforcement department. The Russian government has made another huge step on the path toward creating a tailored regulatory framework for digital assets, unveiling its consolidated view that crypto is to be treated as currency rather than swept under the rug of a blanket ban. While this movement in the direction of crypto’s formal legitimization is a welcomed development, a host of questions persists related to both the exact shape of the new regime and its enforcement. The biggest enforcement story of …

Commodity Futures Trading Commission chair Rostin Behnam is looking to members of Congress to address the commission’s lack of enforcement authority in the digital asset space. At a Wednesday hearing titled “Examining Digital Assets: Risks, Regulation, and Innovation,” Behnam told lawmakers with the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry that the CFTC’s authority was currently limited to addressing fraud and manipulation of digital assets without a clear regulatory framework. The CFTC chair added that because there was currently a patchwork of regulation and enforcement authority across multiple government agencies, the bulk of the agency’s actions taken in the last …

In a letter to the leadership of the United States House Financial Services Committee, ranking member Patrick McHenry took a jab at “inconsistent treatment and jurisdictional uncertainty” inherent in U.S. crypto regulation and called for the Committee to take on its critical issues. McHenry, a Republican representing North Carolina, opened by mentioning that the Committee’s Democrat Chairwoman Maxine Waters is looking to schedule additional hearings addressing matters pertinent to the digital asset industry. He further stressed the need for identifying and prioritizing the key issues and achieving a “broad, bipartisan consensus” on the matters affecting the industry that holds immense …

Chris Giancarlo, who served as chair for the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission until 2019, will be joining the board of directors for blockchain startup Digital Asset. In a Tuesday announcement, Digital Asset said Giancarlo would be providing counsel on asset tokenization, distributed ledger technology, and the possible impact of regulatory developments on the crypto space. The former CFTC chair is currently working as senior counsel at the Willkie Farr & Gallagher law firm, and co-founded the Digital Dollar Project, a non-profit organization aimed at generating data to inform U.S. lawmakers on developing a central bank digital currency, or CBDC. …

On Sunday, Hayden Adams, CEO and founder of popular decentralized exchange, or DEX, Uniswap (UNI), claimed that his JP Morgan Chase bank accounts were shut down with no explanation. In addition, Adams stated that the incident was personal in nature as he knew "many individuals and companies who have been similarly targeted simply for working in the crypto industry." This week @jpmorgan @Chase closed my bank accounts with no notice or explanation ‍ I know many individuals and companies who have been similarly targeted simply for working in the crypto industry Thanks for making it a personal — hayden.eth (@haydenzadams) …

Blockchain investment firm CoinFund has appointed former United States commodities regulator Christopher Giancarlo as a strategic adviser — a move that should help the Brooklyn-based company navigate complex and ever-changing regulatory requirements in its home country. Often referred to as “Crypto Dad” by the blockchain community for his support of digital assets, Giancarlo was nominated as commissioner of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) in 2014. In January 2017, he would become the agency’s acting chair before assuming the role full-time in August of the same year. He held the position until July 2019. CoinFund president Christopher Perkins described Giancarlo …

The White House has officially submitted President Joe Biden’s nominations to fill two seats at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission with the upcoming departure of another commissioner. In a Friday announcement, the White House said it had sent Citi managing director Caroline Pham’s and Summer Mersinger’s names to the Senate for confirmation. Mersinger previously served as chief of staff to commissioner Dawn Stump — who is expected to leave the agency this year — as well as the director of the Office of Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs. She and Pham will be taking the places of recently departed commissioner Dan …

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed a suit against Australian Craig Derel Sproule for the allegedly “fraudulent and unregistered” sale “of digital asset securities” in an Initial Coin Offering his company conducted in 2018. The SEC alleges in a Jan. 6 complaint that Sproule’s company, Metavine, Inc. which operated the ICO for Crowd Machine (CMCT) from Jan. to April 2018, sold unregistered securities, never made the project operational and “materially misrepresented how it intended to use ICO proceeds.” In total, the SEC says Sproule raised at least $33 million dollars, but that he now lacks “sufficient …

New York-based crypto predictions platform Polymarket has reached a settlement with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to pay a fine of $1.4 million. Polymarket is a decentralized platform that enables users to bet on the outcomes of event markets such as pro-sports games and political elections via binary options contracts. On Jan. 3, the CFTC announced that it had entered an order filing and simultaneously settling charges against Polymarket, with the platform found to have operated an “illegal unregistered or non-designated facility” since June 2020. Under the order, Polymarket is required to pay a civil monetary penalty of $1.4 …

The crypto regulation regime in any jurisdiction is an equilibrium among multiple institutional, group and personal interests of actors who have a sway over financial and monetary policies. These interests never perfectly align, frequently resulting in contradictory signals coming out of various power centers. Speaking about systemic risks facing the world’s largest economy last week, the United States Federal Reserve chair said digital assets were not a financial stability concern. Two days later, the U.S. Financial Stability Oversight Council issued a report that concluded that stablecoins and decentralized finance could pose sizeable financial stability risks. The source of this discrepancy …