What has been going on in crypto lately?
2 min readJan 24, 2025
- Gary Gensler stepped down as the SEC Chairman. Current Acting Chairman Mark Uyeda launched a task force to develop a new framework for crypto regulations, which will be led by SEC commissioner Hester Peirce.
- In France, co-founder of crypto wallet company Ledger David Balland was freed after being kidnapped. Balland was abducted from his home in Cher on the morning of January 21. The kidnappers demanded a large ransom in cryptocurrency. Eventually, Balland was rescued by French police. An investigation is in progress; the incident details are not released.
- Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan is confident the U.S. banking system will be ready to embrace crypto assets for regular payments if allowed by crypto regulators. According to Moynihan, American banks used to steer clear of cryptocurrencies in retail transactions despite their trading and wealth management branches trading BTC ETFs. “If the rules come in and make it a real thing that you can actually do business with, you will find the banking system will come in hard on the transactional side of it,” Moynihan said.
- A U.S. court overturned Tornado Cash sanctions imposed by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control in 2022. The cause was remanded to the U.S. Court of Appeals. It was concluded that by imposing “illegitimate” sanctions, OFAC had overstepped its authority. Nevertheless, Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev is still in custody on money laundering charges.
