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Jan 26

Ritchie Torres may not fit the stereotype of the crypto bro, but the Bronx native has become one of the sector's top advocates in Congress. In my first magazine feature for

@FortuneMagazine

, I dug into his controversial "liberal case for crypto":

Ritchie Torres went from crypto ‘newbie’ to key ally in Washington. Now he could shape the indust...

The second-term Congressman from the Bronx is one of many who got donations from Sam Bankman-Fried. He's fighting for rules that could help crypto serve the "unbanked."

In a new court filing this afternoon, SBF's lawyers and prosecutors reached an agreement as to his bail conditions and the use of messaging apps. TLDR: He can't use encrypted or ephemeral messaging/call apps (like Signal), but he can use pretty much anything else:

This stat seems hard to believe if it includes Binance US, but they also haven't made clear *who* exactly this impacts

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Binance

@cz_binance

It is worth noting that USD bank transfers are leveraged by only 0.01% of our monthly active users. However, we appreciate that this is still a bad user experience and the team is working on quickly resolving this issue. twitter.com/binance/status…

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Leo Schwartz Retweeted

Joe Weisenthal

@TheStalwart

TRANSCRIPT: The full text of our chat with Steve Eisman, of GFC and Big Short fame, is out. Numerous fascinating insights about the stock market right now, and why he doesn't believe the current tech rally will be sustained. bloomberg.com/news/articles/

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I received confirmation from a Binance spokesperson that the exchange will be suspending U.S. dollar bank transfers as of Wednesday. They added that only 0.01% of monthly active customers will be affected:

Binance suspends bank transfers of U.S. dollars

The world’s biggest crypto exchange says only 0.01% of customers will be affected.

In a press release yesterday, FTX said it was contacting the recipients of political donations to return the funds. The bankruptcy estate had previously estimated that the company and its staff had donated over $90 million:

FTX and Sam Bankman-Fried spent $93 million on political donations. Now the company wants them back

The debtor estate of the bankrupt exchange is seeking to claw back campaign contributions.

Nope (2022)

Personally hoping it's just Ben McKenzie and Mr. Wonderful performing "The Confrontation" from Les Miserables

The next congressional crypto hearing has been scheduled: On Feb. 14, the Senate Banking Committee is hosting “Crypto Crash: Why Financial System Safeguards are Needed for Digital Assets”

I will die on this hill

Feb 2

Some details here on Avraham Eisenberg's initial appearance at SDNY this afternoon:

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Inner City Press

@innercitypress

Feb 2

OK - now Avraham Eisenberg is to be presented here in Magistrates Court @SDNYLIVE, charged for $100 million manipulation of the Mango Markets crypto exchange. Inner City Press will live tweet, thread below twitter.com/innercitypress…

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Feb 2

Brian Klein, the lawyer set to represent Mango Markets exploiter Avraham Eisenberg, has some high-profile crypto and cybercrime cases under his belt, according to his website. Also represented Frances Haugen, the “Facebook Whistleblower"

Feb 1

"It would be very premature to declare victory," says Fed chair Jerome Powell on inflation

Feb 1

House Financial Services chair Patrick McHenry in his opening remarks at the committee's organizational meeting today:

Feb 1

I'm mostly sad that Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II, who petitioned to have cryptocurrency renamed to "creepy dough currency" at a hearing on FTX in December, will not be on the digital assets subcommittee and have the opportunity to advance his mission

I spoke with Rep. French Hill, the Republican chair of the new subcommittee, last week:

Congressional Republicans have Gary Gensler in their crosshairs

Rep. Hill on his new digital assets subcommittee.

Unsurprisingly, two Democratic crypto advocates—Ritchie Torres and Josh Gottheimer—will sit on the House Financial Services' new subcommittee on digital assets. In contrast, Brad Sherman is an outspoken crypto critic, listed as "strongly against" by Coinbase:

The key question remains how the Fed let Moonstone slip by while cracking down on Custodia, with a hat-tip to this important reporting from

@CasPiancey

protos.com

Exclusive: The Fed responds to the Moonstone Bank mystery

Protos spoke with Melissa Clark, the Federal Reserve's Lead Financial Institution Policy Analyst, to learn why it approved Moonstone Bank.

I wrote about how the Fed's decision against the digital assets bank Custodia reflects an increasingly severe stance by the government, even as crypto finds dangerous backdoors into traditional finance. With commentary from

@CaitlinLong_

The federal government is cracking down on the crypto industry

Recent actions by the White House and Federal Reserve reflect a harsher stance toward the turbulent sector.

Notably, Judge Kaplan does not agree with SBF’s lawyers’ argument that SBF’s outreach to FTX US general counsel Ryne Miller was “innocuous”

Pending a hearing on Feb. 7, the judge overseeing Sam Bankman-Fried’s case agreed to implement the prosecutors’ proposed conditions of restricting his contact with former employees and cutting off his access to encrypted messaging platforms like Signal:

We need a moratorium on Max Richter songs in sad scenes

Leo Schwartz Retweeted

Justin Slaughter

@JBSDC

For those in and out of government counting on the courts and not Congress to offer “clarity” on crypto regulation, this is a reminder that the time horizon for courts here is long, ie a decade a more.

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Justin Slaughter

@JBSDC

Interesting - this would be first court to suggest that secondary token sales are not securities offerings. twitter.com/osceolamo1948/…

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US Regulators Broke Crypto Enforcement Records in 2022

According to a new report from

@Solidus_Labs

, the CFTC's crypto enforcement pace accelerated by 73% last year, and the SEC announced 30 crypto-related enforcement actions in 2022—the most of any regulator worldwide

soliduslabs.com

SEC, CFTC, OFAC and 24 US states announced more crypto-related enforcement actions in 2022 than in any year prior. Here’s what they prioritized – and why in 2023 they might break those records anew.

Strike is expanding its Bitcoin-powered cross-border payment tool to the Philippines, after launching in Nigeria, Kenya, and Ghana in December. I spoke with

@jackmallers

about the launch:

Strike expands cross-border payments feature to the Philippines

The Jack Mallers-led company launched the feature in Nigeria, Kenya, and Ghana in December.

Leo Schwartz Retweeted

🚨 A federal judge granted news organizations' motion to unseal the names of the co-signers for Sam Bankman-Fried's bond, with the order stayed until Feb. 7 pending a likely appeal

Are anybody else's notifications not working anymore? (Realizing the irony that I won't know if you're replying)

Also love that the judge determines the two co-signers must not be "persons of great wealth" because the bonds are only for $500,000 and $200,000...most of us just have that lying around

Among the news organizations who filed the motion to unseal the co-signers' names are

@innercitypress

and

@CoinDesk

, along with outlets like Bloomberg and Reuters

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Jan 13

CoinDesk has entered the fight to unseal the names of Sam Bankman-Fried's two bail co-signers, joining @innercitypress's petition storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco

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Memorandum & Opinion – #57 in United States v. BANKMAN-FRIED (S.D.N.Y., 1:22-cr-00673) – CourtLis...

Among the reasoning in his decision, Judge Kaplan argues it is speculative to assume that the co-signers would face similar harassment and threats as SBF's family (allegedly) have, and that they voluntarily entered into a highly publicized criminal proceeding

Here's the full opinion from Judge Kaplan:

courtlistener.com

MEMORANDUM OPINION as to Samuel Bankman-Fried: For the foregoing reasons, the News Organizations' motions to intervene (Dkt 31, 40, 42, 43) are GRANTED for the limited purpose of asserting the...

🚨 A federal judge granted news organizations' motion to unseal the names of the co-signers for Sam Bankman-Fried's bond, with the order stayed until Feb. 7 pending a likely appeal

In a court filing today at SDNY, prosecutors say they still have not identified the source of the FTX hack in November and the transfer of Alameda funds in December, although they are still investigating

Prosecutors also shared an email that SBF sent John Ray on Dec. 30 after someone moved around Alameda funds, which was widely suspected to be SBF and led to prosecutors requesting new bail conditions that restricted his access to Alameda/FTX funds:

Also, very curious about this "Senator Toomey" group chat on Signal with Ryne Miller:

Prosecutors pushed back against SBF's claim that his outreach to key FTX employees was "innocuous," filing a letter today with receipts, including his messages to FTX CEO John Ray and FTX US general counsel Ryne Miller

I wrote about that after his arraignment in early Jan. You can find the full letter from SBF's lawyers here: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco

A judge just froze Sam Bankman-Fried’s ability to access FTX and Alameda funds days after reports...

Bankman-Fried tweeted on Dec. 30 that he was not behind the transfers, but federal prosecutors are reportedly looking into the transactions.

Another interesting part of SBF's lawyers' letter from this morning is they asked the judge to remove the bail condition that SBF no longer be able to access or transfer FTX/Alameda funds, arguing that prosecutors had presented no evidence he was behind transfers in December

Last night, prosecutors asked for new bail conditions for SBF after he reached out to key FTX employees. This morning, his lawyers fired back, accusing prosecutors of "sandbagging" the process and saying that SBF was just trying to help: