Coindesk

The new chief counsel of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) freshly-created Crypto Task Force is a crypto lawyer.Michael Selig, who was named chief counsel of the task force in a Monday announcement from the SEC, was previously a New York-based partner at white-shoe international law firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher, where he was a member of the firm’s crypto practice. Before joining Willkie, Selig interned for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).In a Monday X post, former CFTC Chairman Chris Giancarlo, affectionately known as “CryptoDad” by many in the industry, congratulated Selig on his appointment. Giancarlo is also senior counsel at Wilkie Farr, where he leads the firm’s Digital Works practice.“Proud and excited for my protege, former CFTC...

At the Bitcoin Conference in Nashville in July, Donald Trump pledged to create a "strategic national bitcoin reserve." By Sunday morning March 2, that reserve also included ether (ETH), XRP, Solana (SOL) and Cardano (ADA) alongside bitcoin (BTC).Trump’s message on Truth Social said his presidential working group was moving forward on creating the larger-scope crypto reserve, igniting a torrent of feedback from across the crypto community.Many complained that the reserve isn’t just sticking to bitcoin. Others asked if the U.S. should be stockpiling tokens like XRP and Cardano at all. Others wondered what might have changed Trump’s mind.Trump said he wanted to make the U.S. the “crypto capital of the world” and his timing seemed aimed at retail traders....

Sunday's Trump bump in crypto has mostly vanished nearly as quickly as it appeared.In mid-afternoon U.S. action, bitcoin (BTC) is changing hands at $86,700, barely above its level prior to President Trump taking to social media Sunday to tout his plans for coming U.S. crypto reserve.Ether is now actually beneath its pre-Trump level and at 0.025, the ETH/BTC ratio has touched a new five-year low.Other tokens touted by Trump as part of the coming crypto reserve — Solana's (SOL), Ripple's (XRP) and Cardano's (ADA) — have given up sizable amounts of their Sunday gains, though remain somewhat higher than prior to the president's posting.“Crypto vols are still relatively elevated with both majors still reflecting a Put Skew till end-March,” crypto...

Crypto custody firm Copper has hired Tammy Weinrib as its new chief compliance officer and Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) officer for the Americas, the company said in a press release Monday.Weinrib will lead the firm's licensing drive in the U.S. market and will be part of Copper's executive team, based in New York.Her hire is part of Copper's expansion in the U.S., and follows the appointment of Amar Kuchinad as global CEO in October last year.Weinrib was previously employed as chief compliance officer and BSA officer at Binance.US. Prior to this she worked at crypto exchange Gemini.She enjoyed a career in traditional finance before getting into crypto, with stints at Wall Street bank Citi (C), The Royal Bank of Scotland...

Crypto exchange-traded products (ETPs) suffered their largest weekly sell-off on record, with investors pulling approximately $2.9 billion from these funds, according to a report by CoinShares published on Monday.The massive outflows mark a significant shift in sentiment after a prolonged period of steady investment into digital asset products.This latest wave of withdrawals extended a three-week streak of outflows, now totaling $3.8 billion. CoinShares research analyst James Butterfill pointed to several factors likely driving the sell-off, including mounting investor concerns following the recent $1.5 billion hack on crypto exchange Bybit and the Federal Reserve’s increasingly hawkish stance on monetary policy.Before this downturn, crypto investment products had enjoyed 19 consecutive weeks of inflows, suggesting that some investors were locking in profits amid...