BlockFI ordered to stop onboarding New Jersey-based customers
BlockFi CEO Zack Prince rejects the New Jersey securities regulator’s claim that his firm has been offering unlicensed securities to the public. The New Jersey Bureau of Securities had issued a cease and desist order to centralized crypto lending firm, BlockFi, preventing it from onboarding new interest account clients in the state.The news was first broken by Forbes on July 19, with the outlet citing an undated, unpublished draft press release which revealed that the New Jersey Bureau of Securities was planning to issue a Summary Cease and Desist order to BlockFi. The draft reportedly....
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On July 19, the CEO of the crypto financial services firm Blockfi, Zac Prince, told the public that the New Jersey Bureau of Securities has told the company to “stop accepting new BIA clients residing in New Jersey beginning July 22, 2021.” New Jersey’s acting attorney general Andrew Bruck also tweeted about the issue and said “we’ve been closely monitoring activity involving cryptocurrencies for compliance.” New Jersey’s Bureau of Securities Cracks Down on Crypto On Monday, an unpublished draft of a cease and desist order was discovered by the....
Several states’ securities regulators have been furrowing their brows with regards to BlockFi Interest Accounts (BIA) lately. This includes BlockFi’s home state of New Jersey, who was arguably one of the more strict in their action towards the firm; New Jersey issued a cease and desist that instructed the firm to stop offering their BIA product before the end of this week. Now, securities regulators in New Jersey have pumped the brakes for a moment, extending that deadline. However, in the meantime, Vermont has joined the ranks of New Jersey, Texas, and Alabama for issuing....
Earlier this year, crypto lending platform BlockFi started facing the heat from state regulators in New Jersey, Texas, and Alabama. Other states have joined the fold since then, as well. Celsius this week is now facing similar cease and desist demands from all three of the same states that BlockFi first faced. Let’s take a look at what we know thus far, and what it could potentially mean for DeFi moving forward. Regulators Reach: What Celsius Is Facing It’s becoming quickly apparent that Celsius is joining the fight in facing regulators in the same vein that BlockFi has. On....
New Jersey, Texas, and Alabama have individual state regulators issuing concerns that New Jersey-based DeFi firm, BlockFi, is offering unregistered securities. Regulators seem to particularly point to BlockFi’s Interest Account (BIA), which offers rates that consumers are now becoming accustomed to in DeFi – but that have blown traditional banking rates out of the water. The ‘Unusual Three’ Crypto in it’s relatively early emergence in discussions around regulation and broader adoption, has largely been considered a somewhat bipartisan topic. Which makes the....
The penalty comes after months of heightened regulatory attention to crypto lending platforms. On Feb. 14, the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, announced actions against crypto lending company BlockFi over its failure to register high-yield interest accounts that the agency deems to be securities.New Jersey-based BlockFi will pay $50 million in settlement to the SEC and another $50 million to 32 U.S. states that brought similar charges. These are some of the heaviest penalties ever imposed by a U.S. federal regulator on a cryptocurrency service provider. The firm also agreed to....