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Articles 1 - 11 of 11
Full-Text Articles in Law
After Ftx: Can The Original Bitcoin Use Case Be Saved?, Mark Burge
After Ftx: Can The Original Bitcoin Use Case Be Saved?, Mark Burge
Faculty Scholarship
Bitcoin and the other cryptocurrencies spawned by the innovation of blockchain programming have exploded in prominence, both in gains of massive market value and in dramatic market losses, the latter most notably seen in connection with the failure of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange in November 2022. After years of investment and speculation, however, something crucial has faded: the original use case for Bitcoin as a system of payment. Can cryptocurrency-as-a-payment-system be saved, or are day traders and speculators the actual cryptocurrency future? This article suggests that cryptocurrency has been hobbled by a lack of foundational commercial and consumer-protection law that …
Cbdc+: Why Cbdc Proposals Need To Become More Comprehensive To Succeed, Muharem Kianieff
Cbdc+: Why Cbdc Proposals Need To Become More Comprehensive To Succeed, Muharem Kianieff
Law Publications
The innovation that is associated with developing a digital currency has provided for a unique opportunity to reconsider how consumers can access payment mechanisms and conduct retail banking following the emergence of new fintech technologies. As such, this is a prescient time for policy makers to reconsider financial reform efforts to leverage new technological developments as a means of making the payments system more efficient.
This paper considers some of the challenges facing Central Banks as they attempt to navigate these pressing challenges. In particular, the paper will assess the relative prospects for success for some of the more popular …
Taming Wildcat Stablecoins, Gary B. Gorton, Jeffery Y. Zhang
Taming Wildcat Stablecoins, Gary B. Gorton, Jeffery Y. Zhang
Articles
Cryptocurrencies, including stablecoins, are all the rage. Investors are exploring ways to profit off of them. Governments are considering ways to regulate them. While the technology underlying cryptocurrencies is new, the economics is centuries old. Oftentimes, lawmakers are so focused on understanding a new technological innovation that they fail to ask what exactly is being created.
In this case, the new technology has recreated circulating private money in the form of stablecoins, which are similar to the banknotes that circulated in many countries during the nineteenth century. The implication is that stablecoin issuers are unregulated banks. Based on lessons learned …
Stopping Runs In The Digital Era, Luís C. Calderón Gómez
Stopping Runs In The Digital Era, Luís C. Calderón Gómez
Articles
Bank runs, and the financial crises they catalyze and amplify, are incredibly costly-to individuals, families, society, and the economy writ large. Banking regulation has, for the most part, protected us from traditional bank runs for the last ninety years. However, as we saw in the devastating 2008 financial crisis, bank runs can still occur in lightly regulated or opaque segments of the financial sector.
The recent crypto market downturn dramatically forewarned regulators of the potential and significant risks that novel assets could pose to our financial system's stability. In particular, a novel, systemically important asset (stablecoins) revealed its vulnerability to …
U.S. Cryptocurrency Regulation: A Slowly Evolving State Of Affairs, Aaron Poynton
U.S. Cryptocurrency Regulation: A Slowly Evolving State Of Affairs, Aaron Poynton
Notre Dame Journal on Emerging Technologies
After nearly a decade and a half since the creation of the first cryptocurrency, crypto regulation in the United States is fragmented, with different measures taken at the federal and state levels, and even within and among agencies. This sluggish speed is not necessarily a surprise as government regulation has always chased rapid advancements in technology and associated consumer and market behavior changes. However, this is a precarious position for the United States--and the world--as the U.S. is a leader in the global financial community, the high concentration of crypto-based wealth, and economies’ increasingly interconnected and interdependent nature. This working …
Fair Warnings From Ofac’S Settlements With Cryptocurrency Service Providers: Compliance Should Include Lifetime-Of-The-Relationship, In-Process Geolocational Checks, Sarah Jane Hughes
Fair Warnings From Ofac’S Settlements With Cryptocurrency Service Providers: Compliance Should Include Lifetime-Of-The-Relationship, In-Process Geolocational Checks, Sarah Jane Hughes
Articles by Maurer Faculty
In 2022, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) announced numerous settlements with cryptocurrency exchanges. These settlements serve as “fair warnings” to all cryptocurrency service providers who are “U.S. persons” or who offer services to U.S. persons. The term “U.S. persons” is defined in 31 C.F.R. §560.314 as “any United States citizen, permanent resident alien, entity organized under the laws of the United States or any jurisdiction within the United States (including foreign branches), or any person in the United States.”
This article focuses on these “fair warnings” as they have accumulated from prior settlements and from OFAC’s published guidance …
Regulatory Sandboxes Enable Pragmatic Blockchain Regulation, Joshua Durham
Regulatory Sandboxes Enable Pragmatic Blockchain Regulation, Joshua Durham
Washington Journal of Law, Technology & Arts
Since blockchain technology supports digitally-native money, the centralized chokepoints that governments have traditionally targeted to regulate commerce no longer apply to our (digital) property. However, competent regulation furthers basic public policy goals and should enable responsible innovation of this promising technology. This Article discusses pragmatic policies that enable responsible innovation by cultivating regulatory expertise required to write enforceable rules. Responsible innovation is necessary because unlike the early internet, where programmers could manipulate simple colors and text on webpages, these same individuals can now create financial services applications that manipulate actual money—we are faced with an inescapable reality that more is …
From Tether To Terra: The Current Stablecoin Ecosystem And The Failure Of Regulators, Mary E. Burke
From Tether To Terra: The Current Stablecoin Ecosystem And The Failure Of Regulators, Mary E. Burke
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
The Tether controversy and Terra crash have placed stablecoins in the regulatory spotlight. Stablecoins are often portrayed as posing systemic risks to financial markets, with some pundits labelling them “the villain of the finance world.” Global regulatory bodies, namely the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Bank of International Settlement (BIS), and political leaders, including the Biden Administration, have all called for stablecoin regulation. These officials allege that stablecoins’ structure, combined with their exponential growth, pose a unique risk to global markets. Before the May 2022 Terra crash, government reports superficially treated stablecoins by exclusively focusing on asset-backed coins. Post …
Defi: Shadow Banking 2.0?, Hilary J. Allen
Defi: Shadow Banking 2.0?, Hilary J. Allen
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
The growth of so-called “shadow banking” was a significant contributor to the financial crisis of 2008, which had huge social costs that we still grapple with today. Our financial regulatory system still hasn’t fully figured out how to address the risks of the derivatives, securitizations, and money market mutual funds that comprised Shadow Banking 1.0, but we’re already facing the prospect o fShadow Banking 2.0in the form of decentralized finance, or “DeFi.” DeFi’s proponents speak of a future where sending money is as easy as sending a photograph–but money is not the same as a photograph. The stakes are much …
Airdropping Justice: The Constitutionality Of Service Of Process Via Non-Fungible Token, Jenifer Jackson
Airdropping Justice: The Constitutionality Of Service Of Process Via Non-Fungible Token, Jenifer Jackson
Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology
No abstract provided.
Did The Superbowl Ad Curse Heighten Defined Contribution Plan Fiduciary Duties?: Deciphering The Legal And Ethical Landscape Of Cryptocurrency Options In 401(K)S, Lauren K. Valastro
Did The Superbowl Ad Curse Heighten Defined Contribution Plan Fiduciary Duties?: Deciphering The Legal And Ethical Landscape Of Cryptocurrency Options In 401(K)S, Lauren K. Valastro
Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship
Regulating cryptocurrency’s place in America’s most popular retirement savings vehicle generates thorny legal, ethical, and social justice dilemmas. Too little regulation could hurt those at highest risk of underfunded retirement. Too much could exacerbate existing racial, ethnic, and gender inequities.
Though recent regulatory efforts suggest 401(k) administrators violate their fiduciary duty of care by offering cryptocurrency investment options to plan participants, the established fiduciary regime protects 401(k) plan participants from cryptocurrency risk while respecting their savings preferences. Yet, the current framework falls short of ethically and equitably serving all plan participants, particularly members of underserved communities — a problem largely …