Welcome to State of Crypto, a CoinDesk newsletter looking at the intersection of cryptocurrency and government. I’m your host, Nikhilesh De. Two key things happened this week: the Senate advanced its stablecoin bill, and the President hosted over 200 people who bought his memecoin to a dinner at one of his golf clubs. |
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White House crypto council executive director Bo Hines (CoinDesk) |
Crypto overall saw progress this week in its goals. The actual substantive legislative work will continue into next week. |
The industry can breathe a sigh of relief, but the stablecoin bill isn't law yet. |
On Monday night, about a week and a half after the first effort to advance the GENIUS Act failed, 66 Senators voted in favor of cloture on the stablecoin bill, opening up a period of debate and amendment discussion. The bill, while cosmetically a bit different from the previous version that failed to advance, is substantively the same as before, as lawmakers acknowledged. Majority Leader John Thune, in remarks ahead of the cloture vote, noted those similarities. "The bill brought up a week and a half ago is the exact same bill the Democrats apparently now are willing to move forward on," he said. "And then, as now, Republicans were committed to a full debate on the floor with the chance for further bipartisan amendments to the already bipartisan piece of legislation. So it's really hard to understand why we needed to wait an additional 11 days for Democrats to finally agree to move." U.S. President Donald Trump's memecoin dinner hung over the vote since its announcement last month, continuing through to this week with lawmakers concerned about who was buying Trump's tokens (exacerbated when Tron founder Justin Sun announced he was the top holder and reports that a significant number of token holders bought through foreign exchanges who likely could not legally donate funds to Trump otherwise). The White House's insistence that it would not share the names of the attendees will likely continue overhanging this debate going into next week. Democrats who voted against advancing the bill earlier in the month acknowledged that the stablecoin legislation likely wouldn't include any provisions that would block Trump from profiting off his crypto ventures. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said at an event last week that Trump's venture and his potential for profit was "already illegal" and the bill was more focused on stablecoins. Nevertheless, the dinner took place Thursday night. According to reports, Trump spoke briefly, reiterating previous remarks about making the U.S. a more crypto-friendly place before departing. Further reading: |
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Stories you may have missed |
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- Roman Storm's Defense Team Wants to Know if DOJ Withheld Evidence: Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm's lawyers have questions about whether Financial Crime Enforcement Network officials believe mixers qualify as money transmitters, and whether the Department of Justice is hiding anything about their views here, following on from previous disclosures in the Samourai Wallet case.
- NY Prosecutors: FinCEN Opinion on Samourai Wallet 'Irrelevant’ in Roman Storm Case: The Department of Justice said that the FinCEN officials' opinion was not relevant to their case. Judge Katherine Polk Failla has set up a telephone conference for Friday, May 30 at 11:00 a.m. ET.
- U.S. CFTC's Johnson Says She'll Also Exit, Leaving an Empty House for Incoming Chair: CFTC Commissioner Kristin Johnson plans to leave the agency later this year, meaning Brian Quintenz — whenever he's confirmed by the Senate — may well be the only commissioner on the agency, given that Commissioners Caroline Pham (the acting chair), Christy Goldsmith Romero and Summer Mersinger all plan to leave in the coming months.
- 'Major Wake-Up Call': How $400M Coinbase Breach Exposes Crypto's Dark Side: Security experts weighed in on Coinbase's recent security breach disclosure.
- SEC Charges Unicoin, Top Executives With $100M ‘Massive Securities Fraud’: The SEC alleged that Unicoin and its executives lied to investors about the real estate properties they owned, their valuations and other details.
- NYC Mayor Eric Adams Is Creating a Crypto Advisory Council: New York City Mayor Eric Adams hosted a number of crypto and family office executives at Gracie Mansion this week.
- FIFA Teams Up With Avalanche to Build Its Own Blockchain, Expanding Web3 Ambition: FIFA wants to launch a layer-1 blockchain. Anyone going to the World Cup next year?
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- 00:30 UTC + 1 (8:30 p.m. ET) The Senate scheduled a cloture vote for the GENIUS Act, which ultimately advanced with 66 yay votes.
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- 18:00 UTC (2:00 p.m. ET) New York City Mayor Eric Adams hosted a digital assets summit.
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- 23:00 UTC (7:00 p.m. ET) U.S. President Donald Trump hosted 220 TRUMP memecoin holders for a dinner at the Trump National Golf Club in Virginia.
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- (The Washington Post) The Social Security Administration is reversing or ditching initiatives spearheaded by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) due to "proving ineffective [or] yielding unintended consequences," the Post reported.
- (The Verge) The Chicago Sun-Times and Philadelphia Inquirer ran a summer activities preview section that was largely generated with the help of AI, leading to it including books, quotes and people that don't exist. The Sun Times said it received this material from a third-party, which said a freelancer had written the section (and that it was severing ties with the freelancer).
- (Cato Institute) Cato found that at least 50 of the immigrants sent to El Salvador for imprisonment in March were in the U.S. legally — meaning they had entered the U.S. in compliance with immigration laws — following CBS' report that the vast majority (75%) of those immigrants did not have a criminal record.
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If you’ve got thoughts or questions on what I should discuss next week or any other feedback you’d like to share, feel free to email me at nik@coindesk.com or find me on Bluesky @nikhileshde.bsky.social. You can also join the group conversation on Telegram. See y’all next week! |
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