Sam Can’t Watch the Super Bowl Anymore 🏈

In today's edition: 🎙️ New TCB pod on the latest in crypto, 🏦 what's happening in Congress?, 🖊️ SBF's bail conditions changed, and more!

February 15, 2023

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New Podcast Today!

Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Robert Leshner, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news. This week, Polygon Chief Legal Officer Marc Boiron joins the show to examine the SEC’s recent enforcement ramp-up.

  • why Marc thinks NYDFS coming after Paxos is the most interesting thing to analyze in the SEC-BUSD spat

  • whether the SEC and NYDFS actions against Paxos were coordinated 

  • whether a stablecoin is a security and why the SEC might be inclined to go after Paxos and how a stablecoin could resemble a money market fund

  • whether the SEC action against BUSD consolidates Tether's dominance

  • why Robert is nervous about the ramifications of the Paxos situation for all of crypto

  • the unique characteristics of Kraken's staking services that led to settlement with the SEC

  • the meaning of the settlement for other custodial staking services and staking in general

  • why Robert voted in favor of the Uniswap governance proposal and why Haseeb is fine with how a16z voted in the proposal

In Senate Hearing on FTX Crash, New Crypto Legislation Faces Deadlock

What’s Poppin’?

A U.S. judge has called Sam Bankman-Fried back into court this week over his use of a Virtual Private Network (VPN) to access the internet.

NFT marketplace BLUR unlocked 360 million tokens on Tuesday, earning some traders a million-dollar payday.

The widely anticipated Polygon zkEVM solution for Ethereum will hit the mainnet at the end of March.

Binance and Huobi froze over a million-dollars’ worth of stolen crypto after investigators alerted them to illicit transfers linked to the Harmony hack.

On Unchained Premium

In this premium interview, Laura talks with Michael Selig, counsel at Willkie Farr, who shared his insights into the current regulatory landscape of the cryptocurrency and blockchain industry.

In Other News…✍️✍️✍️

  • Senators Elizabeth Warren and Roger Marshall plan to reintroduce legislation extending anti-money laundering laws to cover digital asset wallet providers, miners, validators, and other blockchain network participants.

  • Paxos has already burned more than $700 million of BUSD, after following orders from New York regulators to stop minting the stablecoin. 

  • KeyFi founder Jason Stone and other KeyFi associates have been temporarily restrained from transferring or disposing of most of their property tied to the Celsius bankruptcy case.

  • A Delaware bankruptcy court judge, John T. Dorsey, approved the dismissal of FTX's Turkish entities from the exchange's US bankruptcy proceedings through a signed order on Monday.

  • A former FTX executive's foundation made millions from the company's digital tokens and is now trying to access a frozen account on the exchange.

  • Despite increased regulatory scrutiny, Coinbase and JPMorgan Chase are continuing their partnership, as confirmed by sources familiar with the matter.

  • The Lido community is discussing proposals to stake or sell 20,304 ether ($30 million), currently in its $350 million treasury.

  • Susquehanna Advisors Group reported a 7.5% stake in Silvergate Capital, with shares rising following reports of Citadel Securities' 5.5% stake in the crypto-friendly bank.

Today in Crypto Adoption...

  • The European Commission launched a regulatory sandbox for innovative uses of distributed ledger technology in the crypto space.

  • Siemens, Germany's third largest publicly traded company, issued its first digital bond for 60 million euros ($64 million) on the Polygon blockchain to reduce paperwork and reach potential purchasers directly.

The $$$ Corner…

  • Monad Labs, a tech startup founded by former Jump Trading team members, closed a $19 million seed funding round led by Dragonfly. 

  • Orb Labs, a cross-chain tooling and protocol developer, raised $4.5 million in a seed funding round led by Bain Capital Crypto.

What Do You Meme

📈 Your Market Update 📉

  • BTC is up 1.39%, trading at $22,163

  • ETH is up 2.36%, trading at $1,551

  • BTC dominance: 40.04%

  • Crypto market cap: $1.07 trillion

*All data as of today, 5 am ET

Recommended Reads

  1. Tom Wan on the ramifications of Paxos being ordered to stop issuing BUSD:

  2. Ross Shuel from a16z on the first cohort of Optimism Foundation delegates:

  3. Three Arrows Gives Crypto Another Try by Bloomberg’s Matt Levine

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