3rd June 2023 > > Cricket and the US.

tl;dr

US crypto regulation is under the spotlight once again.

Market Snap

Market Wrap

This tight trading range is rather more robust than one might have expected.

Occasional Series – Short one today

Courtesy of the legendary Greg Wynn, a few of us boys (if that is still a word these days) are off to Lords. Some might say that buying third-day tickets for a test against Ireland wasn’t entirely wise. I say that not declaring as soon as Ollie Pope got his double-century yesterday wasn’t wise. And we all know who was right on that count.

Occasional Series – Marnus Labuschagne

Marnus, ranked by the ICC in first place as a Test batsman, was interviewed by a mainstream newspaper.

Under the headline “Test cricket is coming alive” was the comment “… why he doesn’t play in the IPL”.

That caught my interest, which I think was the reason for that by-line. Read the interview and Marnus says “… he would love to play in the IPL”.

Such an obvious contradiction between headlines and actual content can only ever come from one specific newspaper.

Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – The US

Well, well, well. Regulatory clarity for cryptos may indeed be coming to the US.

A discussion document has been issued that addresses some of the key concerns that crypto supporters currently entertain:

https://financialservices.house.gov/uploadedfiles/digital_002_xml.pdf

Two key issues are addressed, though not necessarily resolved, in this document.

Firstly, the decision as to whether a specific crypto is a security or a commodity – an issue that goes to the heart of the Ripple case and the prospects or otherwise of a tax-dollar creating industry in the US – is tackled in an unsatisfactory manner.

The paper suggests that a crypto project can make a case that it is a commodity by proving sufficient decentralisation. Which kind of misses the point. Decentralisation suggests that no-one person or body could make that case.

And the final arbiter on classification is the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission). Its chair, Gary Gensler, would be mightily pleased with that outcome.

Secondly, the registration of centralised cryptocurrency exchanges would be under the aegis of the CFTC (Commodities and Futures Trading Commission).

Which again slightly misses the point as crypto assets increasingly depart from centralised exchanges for the decentralised world, mostly because of cack-handed regulation to date.

…

But I don’t wish to come across as churlish. This document should help to spark a healthy debate amongst US lawmakers. But maybe not all.

Elizabeth Warren, Senator of Massachusetts, who has declared she is building an “Anti-crypto Army” and is in raptures about the prospects of a dollar CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency) demonstrating forever more she is on the wrong side of the argument when it comes to coercion and control, has failed to respond to requests for her comments.