Regulation

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

Large-scale miners are the dominant players in Bitcoin (BTC) mining — we should know because we are one. Having scaled up from a set of mining rigs in my dorm room, our team at Genesis Digital Assets has grown to over twenty industrial-scale mining farms across the globe in just eight years. Every quarter, we

Yet another statement by a top Indian official suggests that regulatory uncertainty around the status of digital assets in the country will persist in the near term. Responding to the general discussion of the 2022–23 Union Budget at Rajya Sabha, the upper chamber of India’s bicameral parliament, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman stated that she was

2021 was a big year for cryptocurrency. El Salvador became the first country to adopt Bitcoin (BTC) as legal tender. In November 2021, the price of Bitcoin hit an all-time high approaching the psychologically significant mark of $70,000. And, all along the way, industry influencers like Elon Musk have been tweeting their enthusiasm about cryptocurrency

On Feb. 6, the United States Department of the Treasury released a report under the headline “Study of the facilitation of money laundering and terror finance through the trade in works of art.” In fact, only a tiny fraction of the 40-page document is dedicated to the “Emerging Digital Art Market,” by which the department

György Matolcsy, Governor of the Hungarian National Bank, has proposed a blanket ban on all cryptocurrency trading and mining operations across the European Union.  Governor Matolcsy cited the recent crypto ban imposed by China in a blog post shared by the Hungarian central bank a.k.a. Magyar Nemzeti Bank (MNB) titled “Time has come to ban

In her monthly Expert Take column, Selva Ozelli, an international tax attorney and CPA, covers the intersection between emerging technologies and sustainability, and provides the latest developments around taxes, AML/CFT regulations and legal issues affecting crypto and blockchain. At the end of 2021 — a year in which Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) rose 100%

The European Commission has announced that a bill for a digital euro will be proposed in 2023. As first reported by Politico, EC finance chief Mairead McGuinness officially disclosed the EU’s formal consideration of digital euro legislation at a fintech conference on Wednesday. “Our goal is to table legislation in early 2023,” the Commissioner for

Norway is a bastion for renewable energy management in Europe. As much as 99% of Norway’s energy derives from hydropower while the grid often enjoys a green energy surplus.  But for Norway’s largest data center and Bitcoin (BTC) miner, Kryptovault, using regenerative hydropower to attempt to solve valid Bitcoin blocks was not enough. At the Hønefoss

Chris Sununu, who has served as the Governor of New Hampshire since 2017, has established a commission aimed at investigating the technology and laws around digital assets in addition to recommending new legislation. On Wednesday, the New Hampshire Governor’s office announced it would be issuing Executive Order 2022-1 to create the Governor’s Commission on Cryptocurrencies

The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, or Boston Fed, has selected economist Susan M. Collins, University of Michigan provost, to serve as its new president and chief executive officer. The seat became vacant in September 2021, when the then-president Eric Rosengren expedited his retirement amid controversy around his securities trading while in office. Collins, who

Billionaire investor Bill Ackman has called upon New York City mayor to look into the crypto regulatory clampdowns associated with BitLicense. A New Yorker shared his aghast on Twitter about the flawed crypto policies of the city and how it could force him to leave it. The user lashed out at the Bitlicense policy of the

Jason Powell, a member of the Tennessee House of Representatives, has introduced a bill proposing counties, municipalities, and the state to invest in cryptocurrencies and nonfungible tokens, or NFTs.  According to Tennessee House Bill 2644 introduced on Feb. 2, Powell proposed amending the current state code to add crypto, blockchain, and NFTs to the list

Crypto exchange Coinbase has filed for a political action committee reportedly to support “crypto-forward lawmakers” ahead of the 2022 midterm elections in the United States. According to a Feb. 7 filing with the Federal Election Commission, Coinbase’s chief financial officer Alesia Haas and head of U.S. policy Kara Calvert registered the Coinbase Innovation PAC. The

The government and central bank in Russia have reached an agreement on how to regulate cryptocurrencies, according to a Tuesday announcement. Russia’s government and central bank are now working on a draft law that will define crypto as an “analogue of currencies” rather than digital financial assets, set to be launched on Feb. 18. Cryptocurrencies

Authorities in the United States have made arrests and announced the seizure of $3.6 billion in cryptocurrency more than five years after hackers stole 119,756 Bitcoin (BTC) from the Bitfinex exchange. In a Tuesday announcement, the U.S. Department of Justice said it had ordered the arrest of Ilya Lichtenstein and his wife Heather Morgan for