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After five long months of working with South Carolina officials, Genesis Mining has been dropped from the cease and desist order it received back in March 2018 from the South Carolina Securities Division. The company will relaunch to U.S.-based customers shortly. This marks one of the first times a blockchain company has fought back against regulators and been successful.
Shah Hafizi, chief compliance officerCOO and general counsel at Genesis Mining, released the following statement:
Withcoin, a virtual currency reportedly designed for casinos, and listed on the Hitbtc exchange around May, is accused of selling coins using a promotional video propagating alleged lies and misleading information. In April 2018, a video promoting Withcoin went viral on the internet, inviting investors to purchase in advance a coin that was going to be listed on a crypto exchange in May, the message said.
Also read: The Daily: Exchange Operator Pleads Guilty, Scammer Fined Over $ 1.9 Million
After a warning from European law enforcement agency Europol earlier this year that billions of pounds are being laundered through cryptocurrencies, City of London officials have decided to take matters into their own hands.
Transactions made in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are notoriously complicated to trace due to the fact that users can generally generate unlimited numbers of wallets without providing any identifying information. Nevertheless, law enforcement agencies seem to have no trouble tracking down cybercriminals dealing in cryptocurrencies — as evidenced by the recent indictment of Russian intelligence officers who used Bitcoin to fund their interference with the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
India’s central bank told the country’s supreme court on Friday that “allowing dealings in cryptocurrencies like bitcoin would encourage illegal transactions.” Other crypto petitions being heard include one asking the government to “take emergency steps to restrain the sale and purchase of illegal cryptocurrencies.”
Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the country’s central bank, appeared before the supreme court Friday to defend its position regarding cryptocurrencies. RBI issued a circular on April 6 banning financial institutions under its control from providing services to crypto companies.
In an ongoing dispute between banks and cryptocurrency exchanges in Chile, an appeals court has finally ruled in favor of one crypto exchange against one of the largest banks in the country. Five major banks have also separately responded to lawsuits against them in court.
Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space
The Fourth Chamber of the Court of Appeals of Santiago has ruled in favor of cryptocurrency exchange Orionx against Banco Estado for closing its account, local media reported. The ruling, which orders the only government-owned bank in Chile to reopen the exchange’s account, was published on Thursday.
Ripple is staring down the barrel of yet another securities lawsuit — its third one this year.
Filed in the Superior Court of the State of California in San Mateo County, the class action alleges that Ripple and its team illegally sold and promoted XRP, Ripple’s currency, as an unregistered security.
The suit’s plaintiff, David Oconer, is demanding that the court classify XRP as a security, while also seeking relief for the “damages, recession” that he incurred from investing in the coin.
Following a Bloomberg News expose, alleging market manipulation of controversial alternative token Tether (USDT) on its exchange, Kraken fires off a savage blog post mocking journalists and defending their business’ integrity.
Also read: Red Flag Waved in Tether’s Relationship with Kraken Exchange
On Tether: Journalists Defy Logic, Raising Red Flags reveals the San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange is having exactly none of it. A journalist “covering market structure for Bloomberg News inexplicably fails to comprehend basic market concepts such as arbitrage, order books and currency pegs. More troubling, however, was the applause from other ‘journalist’ lemmings as they followed in walking their reputations off a cliff. It defies logic.”
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has openly criticized Blockchain research company nChain’s latest patent award, calling for opponents to challenge it in court.
nChain, whose chief scientist Craig Wright claims to be Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto while heavily endorsing altcoin Bitcoin Cash, received its latest European patent for what it describes as a “digital security invention.”
“This Deterministic Key Generation technique provides for improved secure communication between a pair of nodes or parties on a network, while being able to keep their private keys secret,” a press release issued June 25 claims.
Cryptojacking is on the rise. In fact, it’s now one of the fastest-growing types of cybercrime. And here’s the real kicker: you don’t have to be involved in cryptocurrency to become a victim. In fact, just about as idyllic as Satoshi’s white paper, cryptojacking is completely blind to status, wealth, or centralized organizations.
According to Steve Morgan, Founder and Editor-in-Chief at Cybersecurity Ventures, “Cryptojacking is one of the fastest-growing cybercrimes globally, and the resulting theft of cryptocurrency is incalculable at this time. But, cybercrooks beware, law enforcement agencies have ramped up … the surveillance, capture, arrest, and prosecution of financial cybercriminals … and the online perpetrators can expect stiff sentences for cryptojacking.”
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), U.K.’s top financial watchdog, has advised banks to adopt appropriate measures to minimize the risks and exposure inherent in the cryptocurrency business. This advice was contained in a recent letter sent by the FCA to the CEOs of local U.K. banks.
The FCA encouraged banks to be more thorough in their know-your-customer (KYC) activities. The financial monitoring agency urged banks to be especially watchful of clients who earn considerable revenue from the market, saying:
Swiss voters will decide this Sunday whether to turn back on fractional-reserve banking and support a “sovereign money” concept for the nation’s finances. Proponents of the initiative prescribe deeper centralization to remedy the shortcomings of the traditional financial system – a vision quite different from the decentralization that came with cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, following the 2008 global financial crisis. In today’s Bitcoin in Brief, we also cover a statement by a prominent Russian banker who warns that tight crypto regulations would hamper the development of blockchain technologies.
Also read: Bitcoin in Brief Friday: Bitpanda Offers New Coins, Microsoft Dips Data Center in the Sea
A class action lawsuit is being prepared by a group of lawyers in Japan over forked coins that cryptocurrency exchanges are not granting to their customers. Citing that these coins belong to the customers, the group seeks to change the business practices of crypto exchanges and obtain the forked coins for the plaintiffs.
Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space
A group of lawyers is preparing a class action lawsuit against the majority of crypto exchanges in Japan for withholding customers’ forked cryptocurrencies. They have formed a litigation counsel seeking to represent crypto holders nationwide in obtaining their forked cryptocurrencies from exchanges. The group announced on Thursday, May 31:
On May 13 2018, the Reserve Bank Of Zimbabwe (RBZ) issued guidelines in a circular that detailed cryptocurrency activities taking place within the country are now banned. The RBZ further stated that domestic digital currency operations had sixty days to become compliant. Local reports now reveal the Zimbabwe-based cryptocurrency exchange Golix plans to take the central bank to court for banning digital assets, as the firm emphasizes that the RBZ has no authority to ban cryptocurrencies across the country.
Also read: How Bitcoin Cash Can Avoid the Same Mistakes as Bitcoin Core, Part 4 of 4
The Indian Supreme Court has struck out an interim injunction against the crypto ban of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). The RBI banned banks and other financial institutions from facilitating cryptocurrency trades in the country. In response, a coalition of petitioners, comprised of four crypto exchange platforms and other startups, have gone to court, challenging the RBI’s directive.
The decision by the Supreme Court is the not the end of the matter as the case will be heard on May 17th. According to Crypto Kanoon, the court’s only decision was to decline the interim injunction request. Crypto Kanoon is an Indian legal platform that focuses on the cryptocurrency market.
British entrepreneur Richard Branson has spoken out over the “worrying” spread of bitcoin scam stories and ads. Some of the most common are false endorsements and fake binary trading schemes, he warns. Advising everyone to remain vigilant, Branson suggests that users should report fake stories to the platforms which have published them.
Also read: Facebook to Be Sued for Defamation Related to Scammy Crypto Ads
Good news arrives for cryptocurrency exchanges in Chile as the country’s appeals court has ordered the re-opening of their unexpectedly-closed bank accounts.
Earlier this month, Bitcoinist reported that Chilean cryptocurrency exchanges Buda, Orionx, and CryptoMarket filed appeals to one of the country’s appeals court following the unexpected closure of their bank accounts from Itau Corpbanca, Bank of Nova Scotia, and state-owned Banco del Estado de Chile.
Guillermo Torrealba, Buda’s co-founder and chief executive officer, had explained to Bloomberg:
We might get a rare chance to take a glimpse behind the curtains as a legal dispute shapes up between Zhao Changpeng, the founder of Binance, and a unit of Sequoia Capital. The parties are arguing over a funding deal which has supposedly gone awry.
Founded less than 10 months ago, Binance has grown to become the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by measure of its 24-hour trade volume. The platform’s meteoric rise has become the crown jewel story of crypto-related growth over the past year.
Cryptocurrency associations and businesses from Switzerland, Kazakhstan and Armenia have joined the initiative to sue Internet corporations over restrictions on crypto-related advertisements. The class action lawsuit will be filed in New York. Legal costs will be covered with funds raised through donations to a wallet registered in Estonia.
Also read: Twitter Confirms Restrictions on ICOs and Cryptocurrency Token Sale Ads
Organizations uniting cryptocurrency investors and blockchain companies from three more countries have supported the class action against internet giants banning crypto ads. The move was initiated by Russian, Chinese and South Korean crypto associations, as news.Bitcoin.com reported. During a conference in Moscow last month, they founded a new organization called the Eurasian Blockchain Association (EBA). EBA is tasked with asserting their interests on an international level.
Until regulators come up with rules to curb pump-and-dump schemes, investors need to be extra cautious so they don’t get taken for a ride.
CoinDesk
Options for borrowing and lending with cryptocurrencies are on the rise. One of the latest start-ups to join the likes of SALT and Unchained Capital is BlockFi, a New York City–based startup that issues loans backed by bitcoin and ether to individuals, companies and institutions in 35 U.S. states.
Collateralization of cryptocurrency assets benefits retail borrowers by allowing them to hold onto their crypto assets rather than selling them in order to make large purchases, like buying a car. They can also save on taxes by borrowing against crypto assets versus selling them.
