We have written about some of the significant changes under the new Trump administration with respect to cryptocurrency. See here. There was another seismic shift on April 7, 2025 with the memorandum that Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche wrote to all employees of the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) which, among other things, “effective immediately,” disbanded the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team (NCET) and took other steps to implement President’s Trump statement that “[w]e are…
We have already written about steps taken by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission during the very early days of the Trump administration to distinguish itself in the cryptocurrency space from the SEC under its former Chairman, Gary Gensler. There was recission of Staff Accounting Bulletin 121, which made it easier to custody crypto assets. See here. That was followed by the SEC’s pausing of a number of crypto lawsuits. See here. Then, the SEC voluntary…
In somewhat of a surprising turn of events, on February 19, 2025, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed voluntary motions to dismiss its appeals of parallel decisions handed down by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor. These decisions had vacated the SEC’s February 2024 “Dealer Rule” that sought to broaden the definition of “dealer” to include proprietary trading firms, certain hedge funds, and crypto firms. This move by the SEC is another indication in…
The cryptocurrency world has been rocked this week by an episode involving the LIBRA token and Argentina’s President Javier Milei. What began as a seemingly promising initiative quickly turned into a controversy that has had significant political and financial repercussions. The LIBRA memecoin was launched on February 14, 2025. One of the men allegedly behind the launch, Kelsier CEO Hayden Davis, claimed that he was also involved in the launch of the MELANIA memecoin (for the…
We have already written about steps taken by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission during the early days of the Trump administration to distinguish itself from the SEC under former chair Gary Gensler. See here. This post examines further evidence of that change. Under Chairman Gensler’s leadership, the SEC took an assertive stance on cryptocurrency regulation. Gensler, who served as SEC Chair from 2021 to January 20, 2025, said that he was prioritizing investor protection…
One of the persistent complaints over the way the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has operated in the digital asset space is its failure to issue clear guidelines. Within days of the inauguration of President Trump, and consistent with SEC acting Chairman Mark Uyeda’s commitment to shifting the regulator toward setting clear guidelines for digital assets, on January 23, 2025, the SEC issued Staff Accounting Bulletin (SAB) No. 122, effectively rescinding the controversial SAB No.…
BitMEX is one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency trading platforms. On August 10, 2021, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York entered a Consent Order that the U.S. Commodities Futures and Trading Commission agreed to with five companies charged with operating BitMEX. The order required the BitMEX entities to pay a $100 million civil monetary penalty. See here BitMEX is owned and operated by HDR Global Trading Limited, which is registered…
Cryptocurrency has been a topic of significant debate and evolution worldwide, and Kenya is no exception. The journey of cryptocurrency regulation in Kenya is a tale of transformation from initial skepticism and outright opposition to eventual acceptance and legalization. In the early 2010s, as cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin began gaining global attention, Kenya’s financial landscape was primarily dominated by traditional banking systems and mobile money services like M-Pesa. The Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) was initially…
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has charged two California men in Los Angeles federal court with defrauding investors of more than $22 million in what DOJ describes as the largest non-fungible tokens (NFT) scheme it has ever prosecuted. View the indictment here. Both defendants, aged 23 and hailing from Thousand Oaks, California, were charged with defrauding investors of over $22 million through a series of NFT rug pulls. The term “rug pull” refers to…
Social media – with Tik Tok being the primary medium these days – illustrates the continued power of the internet to lift people from obscurity to international stardom. Haliey Welch is a perfect example. The 22-year-old went viral in the summer of 2024 after a street interview where she used the term “hawk tuah” to describe a sex act, which led to her being known as Hawk Tuah Girl. She used her fame to sell…