From the outside looking in, the United States seems to present a host of amazing financial opportunities. However, when it comes to launching cryptocurrency exchanges or altcoin trading platforms, these possibilities start to dwindle and fade quite rapidly. In this regard, over the past few years, the U.S. regulatory landscape has seemed so hostile toward the crypto industry that a number of prominent exchange operators have preferred not to serve U.S. citizens at all — a case in point being Bancor, a decentralized liquidity network, that recently decided to block American citizens from using its website to convert its tokens. …

The United States House of Representatives has passed a bill that calls for the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) to study blockchain technology in its fight against financial crime. On Sept. 19, the House passed the bill “Advancing Innovation to Assist Law Enforcement Act,” which requires the Director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, Kenneth Blanco, to carry out a study on the use of emerging technologies, such as blockchain technology, within FinCEN. The bill reads: “The Director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) shall carry out a study on [...] whether AI, digital identity technologies, blockchain technologies, and …

Binance is expected to launch its upcoming exchange platform in the United States by the end of the year, with the company’s executive estimating that the platform will launch within “a month or two.” In the interview, Changpeng Zhao (aka CZ), the CEO of Binance, predicted the launch despite acknowledging that many things are still “in flux” regarding the platform’s planned operations in the U.S. CZ noted that the U.S. has historically enacted “very clear regulations” regarding financial technology, adding his expectation that despite current “uncertainties in the regulatory space,” early adopters in the industry will likely be better rewarded. …

Kenneth A. Blanco, the director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), has urged casinos to follow the agency’s guidelines in regards to suspicious convertible virtual currency (CVC) activity. During his speech at the 12th Annual Las Vegas Anti-Money Laundering Conference on Aug. 13, Blanco addressed casinos’ compliance with the FinCEN’s guidance released in May. In their guidance, the FinCEN considered certain business models involving CVC financial institutions to help them comply with their existing obligations under the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). The guidance, however, did not establish any new regulatory expectations or requirements. A gap in reporting Blanco specified …

On July 25, 2019, United States prosecutors filed a complaint against the defunct cryptocurrency exchange BTC-e and its alleged former operator, Alexander Vinnik. The indictment was filed nearly 24 months after Vinnik was arrested in Greece while on holiday with his family and has followed numerous extradition requests from the U.S., France and Russia that have seen Vinnik’s case appear to morph from an investigation into alleged money laundering to a tug-of-war over a strategic intelligence asset between the U.S. and Russia. Vinnik’s arrest in July 2017 On July 26, 2017, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that Vinnik …

Security tokens platform TokenSoft has officially added Know Your Business (KYB) services following a successful alpha test in 2018. The San Francisco-based token issuance platform said in a press release on July 31 that the KYB feature was added in order to enhance customer due diligence (CDD) requirements in compliance with an amendment to the Bank Secrecy Act. Per the press release, the KYB test launched on the eve of the effective date of the United States Financial Crimes Enforcement Network’s (FinCEN) CDD final rule. The CDD rule amended the Bank Secrecy Act in order to improve financial transparency and …

Director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) Kenneth Blanco briefed several members of the United States House on the potential for Libra’s use in money laundering, illicit financing, and other illegal activities, according to a press release from Representative Emanuel Cleaver II. Leading the meeting were Reps. Cleaver, Trey Hollingsworth, Bill Foster, and French Hill, all members of the Committee on Financial Services. Rep. Cleaver, chairman of the Subcommittee on National Security, International Development, and Monetary Policy, said in his statement: “With the evolution of virtual currencies and new marketplaces, nefarious actors are continuously adapting to find new ways …

Blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis has hired a former official from the United States Financial Crimes Enforcement Network and the Department of Justice as Chief Technical Counsel, according to a press release published on June 26 Chainalysis has appointed Michael Mosier as its new Chief Technical Counsel. Mosier will now be responsible for legal expertise of Chainalysis products such as data privacy and global anti-money laundering, sanctions, policy, and government issues. At Chainalysis, Mosier will work closely with Jesse Spiro, Global Head of Policy, who joined the firm from financial information services firm Refinitiv and Kristofer Doucette, Vice President of Government …

It is easy to think of the most prominent blockchain advocates as a united front, whose ranks are tightly closed in the face of the common enemy — a horde of fierce crypto critics, unwieldy regulators, anti-money laundering zealots, “bitcoin is a scam”-ers, and the stakeholders of the old, centralized financial system. On this battlefield, the crypto camp’s fundamental positions are aligned, and its strategic goals are clear. However, in the times of armistice, blockchain champions get together by the campfire to ponder the important details of their common cause, and — astonishingly — at times, they disagree. This time …

Top Stories This Week FinCEN Takes First Enforcement Action Against Peer-to-Peer Cryptocurrency Exchanger In an apparent first, the United States Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has given a penalty to a California resident who has been accused of wilfully violating money transmission laws as a peer-to-peer virtual currency exchanger. The department noted that the move marks its first such enforcement action, thus setting a precedent. The defendant — Eric Powers of Kern County, California — has been fined $35,000 and debarred from future work that qualifies as a money services business. The fine came from the determination that Powers violated …

Individual US states seem to be in competition for the title of the most crypto-friendly in the Union – Ohio’s recent announcement of imminent crypto tax payments being the latest example. Meanwhile, federal authorities remain in disarray with regard to how to define, let alone consistently regulate digital assets. It is not just stakeholders and crypto buffs who bemoan the disorderly state of federal policies: their usual talking points have been recently validated by academics. In an article forthcoming in a Journal of Financial Transformation, University of Arkansas Law School professor Carol Goforth weighed in with an opinion that essentially …

The U.S. Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) is calling on cryptocurrency exchanges to monitor Iranian use of crypto to evade sanctions. The agency requested this in an advisory issued Thursday, Oct. 11. The call comes as part of a wider directive warning of the “systemic” Anti-Money Laundering/Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) risks Iranian activity poses to the global financial system. According to FinCEN, as of 2013 Iranian use of cryptocurrency includes “at least $3.8 million worth of bitcoin-denominated transactions per year.” Conceding that the use of crypto in the country is “comparatively small,” the document warns that crypto represents …