Last week, the Biden administration published a report Monday urging increased regulation of stablecoins. The President's Working Group for Financial Markets called on Congress to subject stablecoin issuers to the same strict federal oversight as banks.
Treasury Under Secretary for Domestic Finance Nellie Liang said: "We believe legislation is important. This is a new technology, a new innovation. It shouldn't be surprising that the current regulatory framework isn't set up to address some of the new kinds of risks that this could pose."
The regulators proposed rules to require custodial wallet providers to be regulated by a federal agency and limit stablecoin issuers' interactions with non-financial companies such as tech or telecom firms like Meta (NASDAQ: FB).
The new report is part of an ongoing effort by U.S. policymakers to rein in this $138 billion stablecoin segment of the broader crypto industry and mitigate the risks they believe are posed to consumers, markets, and the financial system. But if Congress refuses to pass such laws, the regulatory agencies have the authority to draft their own measures.
Here is the rest of the week in review:
Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN) is testing a new subscription service that reduces its trading fees for a monthly fee, according to multiple media reports. The subscription service reportedly being called Coinbase One waives the commission fee that Coinbase charges for trades, but customers will still have to pay the spread to buy or sell cryptocurrency. Coinbase confirmed its test of the subscription program: "Customers in the test group will have the ability to buy, sell, and convert digital currencies on the Coinbase platform without a Coinbase fee for each trade (spread fees still apply." The major exchange did not disclose the monthly cost of the subscription, which will be offered to a small number of users to start. Coinbase One could also include other features like priority phone support and an account protection feature that could reimburse users up to $1 million if their funds are stolen. Coinbase's interest in a subscription model as a potentially more predictable source of revenue may be an effort to compete with competitors like Robinhood (NASDAQ: HOOD) that do not charge trading commissions.
Mythical Games said Thursday it has raised a $150 million Series C funding round that brings its total raised to $270 million and boosts its new valuation to $1.25 billion, reaching coveted unicorn status. Andreessen Horowitz led the latest round, with participation from Binance, FTX, D1 Capital, RedBird Capital, The Raine Group, and Galaxy Interactive. The investment vehicles of the National Football League, the band The Chainsmokers, and OneRepublic frontman Ryan Tedder also invested. The game development firm opened early access earlier this year for its Blankos Block Party game, an open-world multiplayer game focused on custom art and design, building and exploration, and curating a collection of digital toys called Blankos. Mythical Games aims to use the new funds to increase its workforce, scale operations, and add new game developers to its non-fungible tokens platform.
Crypto prices rose to $2.775 trillion this week. For the majors, all except stablecoins and Dogecoin (DOGE) ended in the green. In the top 100, the biggest decliners were SHIBA INU (SHIB), down 11%, Decentraland (MANA), down 10%, and ICON (ICX), down 9.5%. The biggest gainers were Kadena (KDA), up a whopping 266%, Loopring (LRC), up 143%, and Crypto.com Coin (CRO), up 73%.
The author does not hold any positions in any of the securities above.