Fintech Daily Digest

The Canadian government Amended its Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act. Canadian and foreign crypto platforms must now implement a full AML/CFT compliance program and register with the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada.

The SEC approved the $28 million offering under Regulation A+, an alternative to an initial public offering meant to help fledgling businesses raise capital, a lawyer for Blockstack said. The company plans to begin selling the tokens to the public Thursday through a website created for the offering.

The State of Wyoming just got a big boost from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA). Their recent joint staff statement on broker-dealer custody of digital securities provides support for Wyoming's regulatory approach to the custody of digital assets.*

Libra could face difficulty entering Thailand because the blockchain-integrated cryptocurrency does not fall under any type of financial legislation, according to a government legal expert.

The Turkish government economic roadmap includes a bid to create a central bank digital currency based on blockchain technology.

The Provident Bank now offers deposit and other banking services to cryptocurrency issuers, exchangers and investors. The bank deploys Bitfury's blockchain analytics tool Crystal that maps cryptocurrency transactions and related entities to reveal suspicious funds and parties.

This blog by ex-IMFer (1976-2003) Warren Coats suggests that the IMF get to work developing a digital SDR, to build the foundation on which the SDR can become a more important international reserve asset.

The NY Attorney General's office, which is embroiled in a legal battle with Tether Bitfinex, filed new documentation showing that Tether held accounts at Metropolitan Bank and Signature Bank, two crypto-friendly banks based in the state.

China's cabinet, the State Council, has given the go-head for the next stage of the central bank's digital currency programme, according to Wang Xin, director of the central bank's research bureau.

This report offers an analytical framework that allows for more systemic assessments of distributed ledger technology (DLT) and its applications. It examines the evolution and typology of the emergent technology, its existing and projected applications, and regulatory and policy issues that they entail. This report highlights the trends, concerns, and potential opportunities of DLTs, especially for Asian markets. It also identifies the benefits and risks to using DLT and offers a functional and proportional approach to these issues.

This paper considers the various requirements for identification in the financial sector and the evolving nature of identity and its evolution from analogue to digitized to digital.The establishment of such utilities for digital or electronic identification requires addressing design questions such as registration methods, data availability and cross-jurisdiction recognitions. Yet, as with any reform, a balance between flow-through efficiency and cyber-security needs to be reached to ensure the objectives of financial inclusion and market integrity are not achieved at the detriment of financial stability.

Libra is the first private cryptocurrency with the potential to change the worldwide payment and monetary system landscape. Due to the scale and reach provided by its affiliation with Facebook, the question will be not whether, but how, to regulate it. This short paper introduces the Libra project and analyses the potential responses open to regulators worldwide.

Crypto custodian Anchorage has raised $40m in Series B funding, with participation by Visa and Andreessen Horowitz who both happen to be Libra founding members.

South Koreans are increasingly going cashless as more people turn to e-wallets in South Korea for both online and offline purchases.

"Today, a new epoch of system integration is underway. However, efforts to make blockchain technology enterprise-friendly split the community into two camps: public networks versus private networks. The dichotomy was wrong-headed from the start, making it easy to believe that public blockchain networks shouldn't be used in confidential business operations and that private networks were safe and secure. The first belief is wrong, and the second is dangerous."

A bill aimed at alleviating the tax burden of cryptocurrency investors was reintroduced today by U.S. Congressman Tom Emmer. The "Safe Harbor for Taxpayers with Forked Assets" bill attempts to bring tax clarity around hard forks.

Facebook has said that current regulatory restrictions mean it won't be launching its digital wallet service and cryptocurrency in India. The RBI has effectively banned banks from providing services to crypto-related firms.

A new trading platform for security tokens has launched with backing from Singapore Exchange. The 1X platform went live with its first listing of an ethereum token, purchasable with Singapore dollars. The token represents about 7% of the shares of Singapore fund manager Aggregate Asset Management.

"Similar to existing and widespread cryptocurrencies such as ethereum and bitcoin, transactions that take place directly on the Libra Blockchain are 'pseudonymous,' meaning that the user's identity is not publicly visible."

Bitcoin is receiving capital flows from two sources: as the primary on-ramp for fiat-based flows and as one of the primary quote currencies in markets for smaller assets. The slowing pace of new assets coming to market through ICOs has kept the growth in global supply muted. Capital and investor interest has remained mostly concentrated in Bitcoin.