Insights

SEC Seems Set on Blocking Spot Bitcoin ETPs

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“We took over this station because the SEC wants to hear from investors like you.” [1] For nearly two months, commuters at Washington D.C.’s Union Station — just steps from the SEC’s offices — were treated to an unusual barrage of…

Digital Currencies’ Role in Facilitating Ransomware Attacks: A Brief Explainer

Patomak’s Kristine Johnson co-authored a paper for Third Way that details how Bitcoin—the most popular digital currency—is used to facilitate ransomware attacks and how criminals try—and sometimes fail—to cover their tracks. Understanding how criminals use digital currencies for ransomware attacks can lead policymakers to solutions in thwarting and enforcing cybercrimes.

Wall Street Journal: Bitcoin ETFs Keep Trying, Despite Regulators’ Rejections

“Is [the SEC] a merit regulator, or should investors be able to decide for themselves what to invest in?” says Paul Atkins, a former SEC commissioner and now chief executive of Patomak Global Partners, a financial consulting firm. Resolving that debate will take time, he says.

Morning Consult: Billions of Dollars Have Migrated to the Blockchain. Now What?

Token Alliance co-chairs Paul Atkins and Jim Newsome write in an op/ed in Morning Consult: The private sector drives innovation; it is one of the best characteristics of the American economy. In contrast, the government operates deliberately and carefully. That is why we worked with Token Alliance, an initiative of the Chamber of Digital Commerce representing more than 350 blockchain and token experts from around the globe, to develop a comprehensive set of guidelines now to help shape the responsible growth of the token marketplace. The collaborative report is designed to be used as a resource among industry innovators, consumers, and policymakers to address so-called “utility tokens,” an aspect of the token economy fighting to be recognized.

WSJ: Silicon Valley Is Into Bitcoin. It Wants to Keep Washington Out.

WSJ reporters Gabriel T. Rubin and Dave Michaels write:

WASHINGTON—Big Silicon Valley backers of cryptocurrencies have sought a broad exemption from federal oversight they say would slow digital coin growth, as the industry steps up lobbying to limit government oversight of the burgeoning world of cryptocurrencies...

...The cryptocurrency industry’s more established players last December scored a victory for their legitimacy when two of the biggest derivatives exchanges, CME Group Inc. and Cboe Global Markets , launched bitcoin futures. By allowing the contracts to come to market, the CFTC signaled that the bitcoin exchanges whose indexes were used to reference the contracts had proper safeguards against fraud and manipulation.

“It was good to help institutionalize bitcoin and have those on supervised platforms,” Mr. Atkins, the former SEC commissioner, said April 11 at a cryptocurrency conference.