But crypto companies have begun to push back, with some threatening to decamp from the U.S. entirely should this dynamic of policing by enforcement continue. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong condemned the SEC’s actions against the exchange and suggested the company may be forced to move its headquarters overseas. Armstrong later walked back the threat of relocating abroad, but Coinbase and other major crypto firms have still begun to invest more heavily in their international operations. Crypto market participants nevertheless hope that the spate of legal challenges brought to crypto companies in 2023 will bring clarity in the form of new regulations. “Clearer regulatory frameworks and stance from regulators globally have provided a sense of legitimacy and security, encouraging more widespread participation in the bitcoin market,” Alyse Killeen, managing partner of Stillmark Capital, told CNBC. The crypto industry saw the most legislative progress on crypto laws in the U.S. this year, with one of the competing digital asset bills making it past multiple House committees for the first time. Even as U.S. lawmakers take steps toward crypto legislation, there remains no law in the U.S. tailored specifically for the industry. Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough’s Levin tells CNBC it’s unlikely that we’ll see much progress in a presidential election year and with a divided federal government. He argues that even without rules on crypto from lawmakers, routine complaints that U.S. regulators are not providing guidance to the industry are without merit. According to Levin, “The SEC, the CFTC and FinCEN routinely provide informal guidance on the regulation of digital assets and cryptocurrencies.” “The SEC even went so far as to provide a framework for the analysis of digital assets and cryptocurrencies. The SEC also created a fake digital asset (Hosey Coin) that gave advice to the FinTech community on how not to launch a digital asset,” Levin added. “Some members of the industry forget the SEC is relying on laws that were written when American football players wore leather helmets, and the SEC must apply those laws to the FinTech industry,” he said. Despite crypto’s recent fading buzz, Killeen of Stillmark Capital doesn’t expect regulators to become fatigued by crypto in 2024. In the same time year that two of crypto’s leading figures were sent to jail, shares of Coinbase — and prices of digital currencies like bitcoin and ether — have rallied sharply. Since the start of this year, Coinbase’s stock price has surged more than 400%. Bitcoin and ether, meanwhile, have both roughly doubled in price. That’s as investors anticipate that approval for a bitcoin exchange-traded fund by the SEC may be around the corner.
United States acts as top cop — setting the crypto standards for the world
