On April 6, Senator Pat Toomey (R-PA) released a draft of his proposed stablecoin legislation titled, Stablecoin Transparency of Reserves and Uniform Safe Transactions Act, or the Stablecoin TRUST Act. Toomey, the ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee, has been a vocal proponent of blockchain innovation, and his recent bill calls for a deft
On March 31, a New York federal court dismissed a proposed securities class-action lawsuit filed against Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. The lawsuit, one of a host of similar actions brought against cryptocurrency exchanges in 2020, was filed by token buyers who purchased cryptocurrency on Binance’s platform.
The plaintiffs asserted that Binance had violated
On April 7, in front of American University’s Kogod School of Business Center for Innovation, Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen addressed the Biden administration’s forthcoming legislative approach to digital assets, as we discussed here, as well as the digitization of the American economy, which Yellen assessed through the lens of five lessons she
On March 17, Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Jack Reed (D-RI), Mark Warner (D-VA), and Jon Tester (D-MT) introduced the Digital Asset Sanctions Compliance Enhancement Act (Act) in an attempt to ensure blacklisted Russian individuals and businesses do not use cryptocurrency to evade economic sanctions.
“In order for the sanctions levied by the United States and
On March 8, the U.S. Federal Reserve Banks launched the FedNow Service Provider Showcase (Showcase) to show financial institutions and users the various services to assist them in implementing the FedNow Service (Service).
The FedNow Service is an instant payment service to provide all depository institutions in the United States with access to instant payment
On March 15, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC or Commission) released a consent agreement with Electronic Payment Systems and its owners John Dorsey and Thomas McCann (collectively, EPS) for allegedly opening credit card processing merchant accounts for fictitious companies on behalf of Money Now Funding (MNF).
The complaint filed against EPS alleges that it had
On March 9, President Biden signed an Executive Order (the Order) to establish the first comprehensive federal digital asset strategy for the U.S., which would promote digital asset innovation while balancing benefits and associated risks. The order directs the Justice Department, U.S. Department of the Treasury, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System,
On February 21, President Biden issued an executive order blocking property of certain persons, and prohibiting transactions regarding Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine. The following day, the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued restrictions on activities with Russian individuals and entities. On February 25, these lists were updated to include political leaders
On February 14, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) updated its Supervision and Examinations Manual to reflect changes it made to the Remittance Transfer Rule (Rule) in a final rule published on June 5, 2020. The changes made to Subpart B of Regulation E, effective July 21, 2020, (1) increased the Rule’s safe harbor for
On February 4, the Department of the Treasury (Treasury) released the “Study of the Facilitation of Money Laundering and Terror Finance through the Trade in Works of Art” (Study). The Study assesses the various risks of the high-value art market based on its propensities for money laundering and illicit financing.
Specifically, the Study