Senate Pushing Crypto Regulation to CFTC?

Senate Plan Would Put Bitcoin, Ether Under Commodity Regulator’s Watch

Leaders of a Senate committee are set to propose legislation that would assign oversight of the two largest cryptocurrencies, bitcoin and ether, to the federal agency that regulates milk futures and interest-rate swaps.

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D., Mich.) and top-ranking Republican John Boozman of Arkansas, are planning to introduce a bill Wednesday that would empower the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to regulate spot markets for digital commodities, a newly created asset class. Currently the CFTC has authority to police derivatives, such as futures and swaps, rather than underlying commodities.

Robinhood’s crypto arm fined $30 mln by New York State’s financial regulator

New York State’s financial regulator has fined the crypto arm of Robinhood Markets Inc $30 million for alleged violations of anti-money-laundering, cybersecurity and consumer protection rules.

The New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) said on Tuesday that Robinhood Crypto did not devote sufficient resources to address compliance and cybersecurity risks.

The SEC’s Cryptocurrency Confusion

After years of threatening to sue Coinbase for listing unregistered securities, the Securities and Exchange Commission is now rumored to have launched an investigation into the company and other exchanges. If it proceeds, the SEC may be on track to make a serious mistake.

Skeptics wonder why Coinbase doesn’t simply register the tokens it sells with the SEC. It’s not that simple. Since its inception, cryptocurrency has confounded regulators because it is unlike any traditional financial instrument. Like regular money, crypto can be used to pay for ordinary goods. Bitcoin is one example, which has a growing base of thousands of merchants who accept payments directly over the currency’s Lightning Network.

‘Securities’ Label in SEC Insider Case May Have Broad Crypto Impact

Less certain are the immediate consequences on crypto exchanges, Reiners said. He said it’s likely that exchanges are nervously reading through the SEC’s complaint, looking at what is currently listed on their platforms, and comparing that to how the SEC views the nine digital assets in question.

Reiners said he does not see the SEC filing complaints against exchanges until a court has weighed in on whether the tokens in question are in fact securities.

“They’ll wait and then if the court agrees with them, of course at that point the exchanges themselves will be forced to register,” Reiners said. “To me, maybe it’s a longer process to getting to a desired outcome, but I think in the SEC’s case it’s a more surefooted way to get to the desired outcome, which is to have crypto exchanges brought into the securities regulatory perimeter.”

MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin Maximalist CEO Saylor Hands Job to Deputy, Takes Executive Chairman Role

Michael Saylor, one of the most prominent bitcoin backers in corporate America, handed the chief executive officer role at MicroStrategy (MSTR) to a deputy and became executive chairman, putting his focus exclusively on hoarding cryptocurrencies.

He founded the company in 1989 as a software developer, but in recent years began buying billions of dollars of bitcoin with MicroStrategy’s money — much of it borrowed through debt sales. Phong Le, who had been the company’s president, is the new CEO, according to a statement Tuesday.

2022 S&P 500 Board Diversity SnapshotThe snapshot also highlights proxy disclosures related to veterans and directors with disabilities and provides advice to boards for increasing refreshment and building a robust — and diverse — board talent pipeline. Among the highlights:

--72% of the incoming S&P 500 class of directors come from historically underrepresented groups.

--32% of all S&P 500 directors are women and 22% are from historically underrepresented racial and ethnic groups — defined as Black or African American, Asian, Hispanic or Latino/a, two or more races/ethnicities, American Indian/Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander.

Crypto Market Takes a Fresh Hit as Thousands of Solana Wallets Hacked

Hackers targeted the Solana ecosystem early Wednesday with thousands of wallets affected in the latest hit to the cryptocurrency market after bridge protocol Nomad was attacked at the start of the week.

Estimates of the damage vary. Just over $5.2 million in cryptoassets have been stolen so far from more than 7,900 Solana wallets, according to blockchain forensics firm Elliptic. Security company PeckShield said four Solana wallet addresses drained approximately $8 million from victims.