Despite a relentless campaign from institutional powerbrokers like Senator Elizabeth Warren, the US Senate advanced the GENIUS Act, marking a watershed moment for stablecoin regulation and exposing the limits of establishment resistance. Opinion by: Zachary Kelman, attorney In 2021, Crypto-America was in the doldrums. Senator Elizabeth Warren and her loyal SEC enforcer, Gary Gensler, unleashed a blitzkrieg against crypto, bombarding platforms with lawsuits and pushing legislation so heavy-handed that many feared it would cripple America’s burgeoning crypto industry. The pièce de résistance of regulatory absurdity arrived as a poison pill in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) — the notorious “DeFi Broker Rule.” Under this provision, protocols and node operators were given the Kafkaesque requirement of collecting the names and addresses of every wallet holder on their blockchains. Read more
Trump offers light relief for Bitcoin price action while calling Fed Chair Jerome Powell a "stupid person" with interest-rate cut hopes absent. Key points: Bitcoin sees light relief as US President Trump reveals that Iran had been in touch. Trump calls Fed Chair Jerome Powell “stupid” as markets see no chance of an interest-rate cut at the June 18 FOMC meeting. Read more
A fake post from the Paraguayan president’s X account claimed Bitcoin was now legal tender, triggering a sharp 4% price spike. At around 00:53 GMT on June 10, 2025, the verified X account of Paraguayan President Santiago Peña posted something that set the crypto world buzzing. The now-deleted tweet stated that Paraguay had officially approved Bitcoin as legal tender. It added that President Peña had signed into law a $5 million Bitcoin (BTC) reserve and bond access for crypto-enabled citizens. It also contained a wallet address prompting users to stake BTC. Read more
USDC, a US dollar-pegged stablecoin by Circle and Coinbase, is set to become a collateral for US futures trading as part of a joint effort by Coinbase Derivatives and Nodal Clear. Coinbase Derivatives is expanding its partnership with clearinghouse Nodal Clear to bring Circle’s USDC stablecoin into US futures markets as eligible collateral. On Wednesday, the companies announced that USDC will now be accepted as collateral for margined futures trading, a move designed to encourage stablecoin adoption in regulated derivatives markets. The integration is subject to approval by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), with Coinbase Derivatives and Nodal Clear working with the authority to bring USDC to the US futures market. Read more
The US Senate voted to pass the GENIUS Act, a bill regulating stablecoins, but observers believe lawmakers may have ignored stability concerns in Treasury markets. The US crypto industry is celebrating as the GENIUS Act, a framework for stablecoin regulation, was passed in the US Senate on June 17. The bill passed 68-30 in a bipartisan effort, roughly six weeks after Tennessee Senator Bill Hagerty introduced it to the Senate. It will now head to the House of Representatives, where Congress must reconcile it with the House’s own STABLE Act, which also seeks to regulate stablecoins. The act holds a number of provisions, from rules for issuers, Anti-Money Laundering measures and mandatory 1:1 backing of stablecoins with reserves like US dollars and short-term Treasury securities. Read more