A new legal advisory notice from the US Office of Government Ethics bans any employee who owns cryptocurrency from working on Federal crypto regulation.
US government officials who confidentially own cryptocurrencies are now banned from working on regulations and policies that could affect the value of digital assets.
A new advisory notice out by the US Office of Government Ethics (OGE) on Tuesday stated that the de minimis exemption — which allows for the owners of securities who hold an amount below a certain edge to work on policy related to that security — is generally inapplicable when it comes to cryptocurrencies and stablecoins.
“As a result, an employee who holds any amount of a cryptocurrency or stablecoin may not participate in a particular matter if the employee knows that particular matter could have a direct and predictable effect on the value of their cryptocurrency or stablecoins.”
The notice provided an example set-up whereby an employee who owns a mere $100 of a certain stablecoin, is asked to work on stablecoin regulation — the employee in question cannot take part in work concerning regulation “until and unless they divest their interests in [that] stablecoin.”
The notice stated that this ruling still applies even if the cryptocurrency or stablecoin in question were to ever “constitute [a security] for purposes of the federal or state securities laws.”
The new presiding applies universally to all federal government employees including The White House, The Federal Reserve, and The Department of the Treasury.
The only exception from the OGE’s restriction on crypto ownership is that policymakers are permitted to hold up to $50,000 in mutual funds that invest approximately in companies that would benefit from crypto and blockchain technology. The reasoning for this exception is that they “are considered diversified funds.”
In spite of the apparently harsh rules concerning employee investment in the crypto sector, the United States continues to move forward in integrating the cryptocurrency industry, with the US president Joe Biden declaring a “whole-of-government” tactic to regulation concerning the digital asset sector.
According to the co-founder and CEO of Cabital, Raymond Shu, new legislative proposals could make the U.S. one of the only Western countries to fully regulate and accept stablecoins and other digital assets as official parts of the economic system.
Leave a Reply