Last week saw Blockchain Week in Paris, and the epicenter of cryptocurrency policy and regulation conversation moved to the French capital. Cointelegraph reported extensively from the ground and conducted a series of interviews with some of the crypto industry captains who shared their thoughts on the state of regulatory affairs. On the one hand, Binance’s Changpeng Zhao said he was excited to see regulators embrace financial innovation and introduce crypto-friendly policies, calling it a major trend of 2022. Bertrand Perez, COO of the Web3 Foundation, opined. that many policy makers, including some from the European Union, still tend to move too quickly on crypto regulation without properly educating themselves on the subject. Ripple’s Brad Garlinghouse even briefed the Blockchain Week crowd on the latest developments in the company’s court fight against the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, which indeed saw some upside for XRP issuer Ripple.
Ripple celebrates the setback of the judge against the Securities and Exchange Commission of the United States
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse seemed happy in Paris. He told an audience at Blockchain Week in Paris that Ripple’s court battle with the SEC “has gone exceedingly well and much better than he could have hoped for when it started about 15 months ago.” The cause of Garlinghouse’s jubilation was a decision by Judge Sarah Netburn regarding documents related to a speech given by William Hinman in 2018, when he was director of the SEC’s Division of Corporate Finance. Hinman said at the time that Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) are not securities. The SEC maintained during the Ripple trial that the speech reflected Hinman’s personal views and not agency policy. The agency then argued that Hinman’s speech reflected Ripple’s policies and not Hinman’s personal views, so it wanted them to be protected by the Deliberative Process Privilege (DPP). The judge wrote: “Having insisted that [el discurso] reflected Hinman’s personal views, the SEC cannot now reject its own position.” What the SEC can do is appeal that decision within two weeks.
Coin Center opposes the SEC redefining what an exchange is
The Coin Center lobby group said it stood for free speech in its written comment on a US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposal to change a rule of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. At issue is the definition of an exchange, which the SEC suggests “includes systems that offer the use of non-firm business interests and communication protocols.” Coin Center said the rule change would transform the agency’s definition of an exchange, moving from a system that pools orders to one that brings together buyers and sellers. This affects developers and others who trade code, not tokens, and in particular decentralized exchange (DEX) developers. This is a free speech issue, according to the advocacy group. This is not the first time the agency has been accused of violating the First Amendment. The SEC said the change could “reduce regulatory disparities between similar markets.”
Brazil advances with the legislation on cryptocurrencies and the pilot of a CBDC
The Brazilian corner of the cryptoverse is also a happy place lately. The National Congress is expected to pass a bill regulating the cryptocurrency market in Brazil in the first half of this year. After being debated in the Chamber of Deputies since 2015, the bill won approval and a version that unifies it with a bill approved by the Senate is being prepared. The bill would allow the Brazilian president to delegate crypto regulation to an existing body or create a new regulatory body. Additionally, the bill provides for punishments for fraud in virtual asset services and creates incentives for crypto miners to come to the country. Thats not all. The president of the Central Bank of Brazil has confirmed that a central bank digital currency pilot project will be launched this year. The pilot Real Digital would have a fixed supply and would be linked to the national fiat payment system reserve transfer system (STR).
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