You could argue that the crypto industry should be crowdsourcing Blockstack’s legal expenses. Blockstack’s trailblazing work with the Securities and Exchange Commission on the initial coin offering (ICO) for its native Stacks (STX) tokens made headlines in mid-2019. On Monday, Cointelegraph reported on Blockstack’s legal analysis that said that upon the launch of its 2.0 network next month, Stacks will be sufficiently decentralized to leave the status of a security. Blockstack itself will be rebranding to Hiro Systems to further encourage the independence of Stacks tokens. To explain a complicated topic quickly, the concept of a “security” in investment is …

Fidelity Digital Assets, the crypto arm of the asset management conglomerate, will allow institutional customers to pledge their Bitcoin (BTC) as collateral for cash loans. As reported Wednesday by Bloomberg, the firm partnered with crypto lender BlockFi to disburse the loans. Institutional clients of Fidelity’s custodial solution will be able to draw cash loans from their stored Bitcoin without having to move it, provided they have an account with BlockFi. The target customers of this feature are primarily hedge funds, miners and over-the-counter trading desks. Overcollateralized lending is generally used to access liquidity without losing a long position on the …

Dissolved limited liability company Crypto Traders Management is seeing its legal troubles multiply. Per a Friday legal filing in Utah, CTM and its former manager Shawn Cutting are trying to fight off a subpoena from the Securities and Exchange Commission. The SEC is apparently demanding financial data from Cutting — specifically, all of the transaction information from his Wells Fargo accounts as well as his communications with the bank. Cutting is trying to quash the SEC's request by pleading a right to financial privacy. Back in July, former investors in CTM filed a civil suit accusing the firm of selling …

A number of TV shows have mentioned Bitcoin (BTC) or other cryptocurrencies over the years, including Big Bang Theory in 2017 and The Simpsons in 2020. One of the latest crypto mentions occurred during the premiere of the 11th season of Shameless, in an episode called “This is Chicago.” “It’s my crypto,” character Dash says, elaborating, “My Bitcoin. It’s down 30 and I was using it to leverage my Tether and my Ethereum.” Another character responded: “I have no idea what you just said.” Dash continued: “Oil futures gutted my portfolio last spring. So if there’s another two-point drop on …

Ripple Labs has sold a huge chunk of its 2019 investment in MoneyGram. Per a Friday night filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday night, from Nov. 27 through Dec. 4, Ripple Labs managed to sell 2,264,113 shares of MoneyGram (MGI). The tech firm netted a total of $15,303,792.60 from the sales. MoneyGram's stock value has soared in recent months, from $2.94 on Oct. 1 to $8.53 on Nov. 23. In no small part thanks to news of Ripple's sell-off, MGI has slipped back down to $6.54 as of publication. Despite a flurry of announcements of expanding integration …

As Cointelegraph reported two weeks ago, the Securities and Exchange Commission put out a rare no-action letter in defense of IMVU’s new blockchain-based VCOIN. VCOIN is only the third digital token to get such legal protection from the U.S. securities regulator, which makes it an exciting development. The SEC has been extremely active in punishing initial coin offerings that it views as unregistered securities offerings, but it has been more reluctant to define what does not count as a security — a problem that Commissioner Hester Peirce noted just last night. A no-action letter is, however, not the same as …

A decentralized anonymous margin trading exchange says it doesn’t require Know Your Customer checks — meaning users can begin trading as soon as they’ve generated a wallet. DMEX says it is able to operate without KYC because of how it runs on a smart contract, and positions itself as a compelling alternative to BitMEX. Most decentralized exchanges use synchronous trade executions, meaning that users have to wait for their last trade to be registered on the blockchain before they can perform a new one. DMEX addresses this by using a state-of-the-art matching engine that monitors account balances while the confirmation …

Coinbase, the United States’ largest cryptocurrency exchange, announced that it facilitated one of the largest institutional Bitcoin (BTC) purchases in 2020. According to an official announcement, Coinbase was selected as the primary execution partner for MicroStrategy’s $425 million purchase of Bitcoin in September 2020. Brett Tejpaul, head of institutional sales at Coinbase, provided more details about the purchase as well as the company’s aim to facilitate institutional purchases in a Dec. 1 blog post. “Using our advanced execution capabilities, leading crypto prime brokerage platform, and OTC desk, we were able to buy a significant amount of Bitcoin on behalf of …

In the midst of the crippling price dips earlier this week, cryptocurrency traders seemed beset on all sides by fear, uncertainty, and doubt. However, Dermot McGrath, head of research at blockchain investment firm Sino Global Capital, said the firm prefers taking a long term view. Shortly after a Thanksgiving Bitcoin dip to $16,200, news broke that the Chinese government had seized $4.2 billion in cryptocurrencies as part of the Plustoken Ponzi scheme court proceedings. Rumors swirled that those tokens were poised to be dumped on the open market, crashing prices further. However, Sino Global CEO Matthew Graham wrote on Twitter …

A PayPal user reports their account has been restricted after they traded crypto too frequently using the platform. According to U.S.-based Reddit user u/TheCoolDoc, PayPal sent them a message stating it had permanently limited their account “due to potential risk.” The user said they had made at least 10 crypto transactions within a week, purchasing during dips and selling when the price was high, and PayPal had asked for an explanation for each transaction. “The system flagged my account thinking I was selling items worth $10,000 in one week when I hadn't done so in the last 6 years I’ve …

With Bitcoin within $1,000 of its all-time high price of $19,891 set in December 2017, trading on major crypto exchange Binance is also hitting new heights, with more than $37 billion in volume in the last 24 hours. According to data from CoinMarketCap, the daily trading volume of Binance has now hit $37,291,444,117, up 40.5% in the last 24 hours. Last week, the analytics site reported $25 billion in trading volume for Binance. In addition, Bitcoin (BTC) futures open interest on Binance hit an all-time high of $1.17 billion, according to crypto analytics site Glassnode. #Bitcoin futures open interest on …

United States crypto exchange Coinbase Pro announced today that customers would not be able to use margin trading on the platform beginning on Wednesday. According to the Coinbase blog, chief legal officer Paul Grewal said that no new margin trades would be allowed starting on Nov. 25 at 2:00 PST. The exchange stated that it would take the product offline in December “once all existing margin positions have expired.” “We believe clear, common sense regulations for margin lending products are needed to protect and provide peace of mind to U.S customers,” said Grewal. “We look forward to working closely with …