Patrick Daugherty Comments on Senator Warren’s New Crypto Bill

Foley & Lardner LLP Partner Patrick Daugherty is quoted in the Fortune article, “Elizabeth Warren’s new crypto bill sent shockwaves through the industry. Here’s what it could mean,” discussing the pros and cons of the new legislation that aims to bring know-your-customer rules to different players in the crypto ecosystem.

Daugherty described the pros and cons of the bill, noting that empowering federal financial regulatory agencies to audit “money services businesses” for compliance is “one correct step to make.” He noted, however, that the bill overreaches in its definition of what constitutes such a business. The bill’s language as it stands could impose burdensome requirements on crypto miners, validators, wallet providers, and even hardware manufacturers.

Daugherty explained that depending on one’s view of crypto, these elements and others of the bill could be viewed as either a bug or feature. “If you don’t trust crypto assets at all, or if you have some philosophical opposition to them, then you will probably regard these as features,” he added.