from chaos to order
1. Moves & news: Financial innovation & technology for the 21st century
This week, the House Financial Services and Agricultural Committees made history when they held “legislative markups” — a step in the lawmaking process where bills are debated and amended before consideration by the full House of Representatives — on the Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act (HR 4763). For the first time ever, two standing Congressional Committees passed landmark legislation out of committee that would provide a federal regulatory structure for the crypto ecosystem.
Why is this so significant? It is the first, but very important step, towards a bill becoming law. The next step is for the bill to move to a vote on the House of Representatives floor with bipartisan support (as this week’s events indicated it is indeed a bipartisan issue). And while there is still a long way to go to make this bill a law — it still needs to pass the House, Senate, and be signed by the President — it could significantly decrease regulatory confusion in the crypto industry.
share:
https://twitter.com/cdixon/status/1684236396956127233
https://twitter.com/Collin_McCune/status/1684378228272635904
related reading:
“Crypto bill passes congressional committee in victory for industry” / Reuters
“Crypto regulatory bill advances to floor” / Axios
other resources:
Engaging Policymakers 101 with Collin McCune / a16z crypto Startup School
Crypto Policy & Regulation: What's Going On? with Miles Jennings, Brian Quintenz, Collin McCune, Sonal Chokshi / web3 with a16z podcast
Crypto Regulations, Illicit Finance, Privacy and Beyond with Michele Korver, Jai Ramaswamy, Sonal Chokshi / web3 with a16z podcast
see also:
Be sure to check out the latest installment (released just yesterday) in our ongoing regulatory recaps series — where the a16z crypto regulatory team shares useful agency-specific, as well as regional, news & moves.
2. Op-ed: It’s time to move crypto from chaos to order (in Fortune)
Miles Jennings and Brian Quintenz
Many believe blockchains and crypto are a groundbreaking technology that enable creativity and entrepreneurship, while some regard these tools as just another internet fad. Regardless of where you stand, it’s indisputable that consumers and entrepreneurs alike in the burgeoning crypto and web3 sector face tremendous regulatory uncertainty — which holds the legitimate industry back, and allows bad actors to flourish.
This tension was on full display as a federal district court recently issued a much-anticipated summary judgment in the Securities and Exchange Commission’s lawsuit against Ripple Labs and two of its founders. While it was a potentially significant win for crypto (and a rebuff to the SEC’s ongoing war against it), the ruling results in a confusing set of outcomes that highlights the long standing uncertainty plaguing an industry clamoring for stability. So what are entrepreneurs to make of the decision?
3. Resources: 17 misconceptions about SNARKs — and why they hold us back
Justin Thaler
An important cryptographic tool that opens up exciting new possibilities in system design, “SNARKs” (Succinct Non-interactive ARgument of Knowledge) have several applications in blockchains — and beyond — because they facilitate trust where it otherwise may not exist. And if a SNARK satisfies the property of zero-knowledge, then it can also be useful for privacy in all sorts of applications (by allowing people to only disclose what they want to, and nothing else) — which is especially useful for privacy-preserving compliance.
But as advances in SNARKs have rapidly accelerated in the past few years, it has also led to confusing terminology, and errors, that slow down progress. So in this article, a16z crypto research partner Justin Thaler outlines 17 misconceptions about SNARKs and how developers, designers, and users can address them.
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-- Sonal Chokshi, Paul Cafiero, and a16z crypto teams
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