United States House of Representatives member Tom Emmer has reportedly suggested that regulating and encouraging innovation in the crypto space should not be a political win for either Democrats or Republicans. According to an interview released Tuesday by Axios reporter Brady Dale, Emmer said many of his colleagues in Congress were treating cryptocurrencies as a risk which merited warnings, rather than an investment opportunity for the United States. The U.S. lawmaker added that encouraging figures like FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried to stay in the country will open more doors for residents rather than driving them away with regulatory uncertainty. Emmer, …

Regulators are tasked with balancing between protecting consumers and creating environments where entrepreneurs and the private sector can thrive. When markets face distortions, perhaps due to an externality or information asymmetry, regulation can play an important role. But regulation can also stifle entrepreneurship and business formation, leaving society and its people worse off. The United States Securities and Exchange Commission has been particularly hostile against cryptocurrency companies and entrepreneurs. For example, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler has remarked that he views Bitcoin (BTC) as a commodity but that many other “crypto financial assets have the key attributes of a security.” He …

In a cease-and-desist letter to fast-growing crypto exchange FTX, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) shed light on a now-deleted tweet from the exchange’s president, Brett Harrison, and issued a stark warning over the company’s messaging. Harrison’s original tweet said, “Direct deposits from employers to FTX US are stored in individually FDIC-insured bank accounts in the users’ names.” He added, “Stocks are held in FDIC-insured and SIPC [Security Investor Protection Corporation]-insured brokerage accounts.” Although Harrison stewarded FTX to its best-ever year in 2021, increasing revenue by 1,000%, the firm now faces the unenviable prospect of running afoul of a powerful …

The Celsius Network is one of many crypto lending firms that has been swept up in the wake of the so-called “crypto contagion.” Rumors of Celsius’ insolvency began circulating in June after the crypto lender was forced to halt withdrawals due to “extreme market conditions” on June 13 and eventually filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy a month later on July 13. The crypto lending firm showed a balance gap of $1.2 billion in its bankruptcy filing, with most liabilities owed to its users. User deposits made up the majority of liabilities at $4.72 billion, while Celsius’ assets include CEL tokens …

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has pushed back a decision on the latest application for a Bitcoin (BTC) spot exchange-traded fund (ETF) by global investment firm VanEck. The company has long been trying to get the green light for what will be the first BTC ETF in America, with its first application lodged with the SEC dating back to 2017 which was eventually denied. VanEck saw a second application ruled out in November 2021 by the SEC, reasoning that the firm had not met standards to protect investors as well as prevent fraudulent and manipulative acts and …

Bitcoin Depot, a major cryptocurrency ATM provider in the United States, is planning to go public through a merger with a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC). Atlanta-based Bitcoin Depot has reached a definitive agreement to merge with the SPAC GSR II Meteora (GSRM) in an $885 million deal in order to go public, the firm officially announced on Thursday. The business combination would result in Bitcoin Depot becoming a publicly listed company as the combined company — to be dubbed Bitcoin Depot Inc. — will trade on the Nasdaq under the new ticker symbol BTM. The merger has been unanimously approved …

Following United States President Joe Biden's announcement of a student loan forgiveness plan that aims to cancel the debt of up to $20,000 for millions of Americans, a Bitcoin (BTC) supporter proposed an alternative method to pay off the loans. Dennis Porter, the CEO of the non-profit organization called Satoshi Action Fund, tweeted that there's another way for the U.S. government to solve the student loan issue. According to Porter, Biden could give each debtor some BTC worth $10,000 and lock it within a smart contract for 10 years. The non-profit executive explained that the contract should be sufficient to …

Are cryptocurrency games innocent fun? Or are they Ponzi schemes facing an imminent crackdown by regulators in the United States? Tokens related to cryptocurrency games — known colloquially as “GameFi” — were worth a cumulative total of nearly $10 billion as of mid-August, give or take a few billion. (The number may vary depending on whether you want to include partially finished projects, how you count the number of tokens that projects technically have in circulation, and so on.) In that sense, whether the games are legal is a $10 billion question that few investors have considered. And that’s an …

The United States filled in the wide gap in Bitcoin (BTC) mining that was left open by China by the end of June 2021. Despite looming rumors of high power consumption, officials in Texas, one of the fastest growing crypto mining hubs in the US, now believe that mining operations can, in fact, garner a symbiotic relationship with the energy industry. A newsletter from the Texas Comptroller’s office revealed the state’s pro-crypto stance with the intent to host long-term miners and operators. Clarifying the general misconception about Bitcoin’s energy usage, the fiscal note highlighted that unlike “manufacturing facilities or industrial …

Kathy Kraninger, former director of the United States Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, or CFPB, said while many in crypto have complained about the lack of regulatory clarity in the country, the legal gray area has afforded the industry opportunities. Speaking to Cointelegraph, Kraninger said Congressional action on dividing the roles of different regulatory agencies — including the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, and Commodity Futures Trading Commission, or CFTC — would be the “best outcome” in her view. However, she added it was unlikely any single department would have total control over the variety of investment products related to …

Things have not been looking too good for the crypto market in recent months, with the market seemingly being gripped by one piece of bad news after another. To this point, on Aug. 8, the United States Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued legal sanctions against digital currency mixer Tornado Cash. As per the regulatory body, since the platform’s inception in 2019, it has been used for a host of illicit money laundering activities estimated to be worth $7 billion. Of this sum, it is estimated that $455 million was controlled by the notorious Lazarus …

Lawyers representing Nathaniel Chastain, the former OpenSea product manager accused of insider trading, have claimed United States authorities only filed charges in an attempt to set legal precedent that nonfungible tokens are securities. In a Friday filing with the Southern District of New York court, Chastain’s legal team from Greenberg Traurig filed a motion to dismiss the indictment against him, which included allegations of wire fraud and money laundering related to an NFT insider trading scheme from June to September 2021. The lawyers argued that the charges against the former OpenSea employee were invalid in part “because the NFTs at …