New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) Superintendent Benjamin Lawsky in a speech yesterday at the BITS Emerging Payment Forum announced the final version of the long-awaited BitLicense. He stressed several points in his short speech, and during the speech, NYDFS published the final version of the rule on…
On May 29, 2015, after a lengthy criminal investigation and multi-week trial, Ross Ulbricht, the mastermind behind Silk Road—one of the most famous enterprises to utilize Bitcoin currency—was sentenced to life in prison in a Manhattan federal courtroom. In 2011, Ulbricht founded Silk Road, an anonymous, online marketplace where everything…
Before a government agency issues regulations implementing a new law—or applies existing regulations to a new technology—it has to do some groundwork. The agency will interpret its authorizing legislation and executive orders before gathering evidence to support the exercise of its rulemaking and enforcement authorities. Some agencies are subject to…
Overstock.com has been a leader in embracing digital currency, and now the company wants to embrace digital securities. On April 24th, Overstock.com filed a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) that explained that their future stock may be offered as cryptographically-secured shares. The filed S-3, which is…
On April 22, 2015, the European Securities and Markets Authority (“ESMA”) – the European Union’s (“EU”) securities watchdog agency – issued a formal call for evidence regarding investments using virtual currency or distributed ledger technology. ESMA is an independent EU authority responsible for safeguarding the stability, integrity, transparency, and efficiency…
MtGox Co., Ltd., once the world’s largest Bitcoin exchange company, is insolvent, bankrupt, and now history. This bankruptcy (which I discussed yesterday) offers lessons to cryptocurrency startups. Mt. Gox’s fundamental lack of professionalism has become painfully clear since it filed for bankruptcy. According to a Wired expose last year, former…
Thousands of creditors may receive disbursements from the bankruptcy of MtGox, Co. Ltd., a Japanese corporation that once ran the world’s largest Bitcoin exchange. The bankruptcy filing last year was a rude awakening to Mt. Gox account holders who believe they collectively owned 750,000 Bitcoin, worth nearly a half billion…
Today’s computers encode data into bits – binary digits in one of two definite states, 0 or 1. Any calculation that needs to be performed with the bits is completed one at a time. Quantum physicists are racing to develop quantum computers, which use the various states of particles to…
Bitcoin continues to push deeper into the fabric of American society as it may now have an impact on who we elect as the President of the United States in 2016. Last week, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul became the first candidate to accept Bitcoin donations for his presidential campaign. In…
A critical but sometimes overlooked topic in the virtual currency world is the Bank Secrecy Act (“BSA”) examination for registered money service businesses. Digital currency companies that meet the definition of an MSB must register and comply with the requirements of the BSA. This includes the implementation of an effective…