Binance US hires former SEC official; U.S. lawmakers introduced bill to remove SEC Chair Gary Gensler; Tether has printed $1 billion USDT on Ethereum!
As Bloomberg reports, Binance US recruited a former SEC official to its legal team in preparation for the lawsuit.
The exchange, which the SEC accuses of selling unregistered securities, has recruited three more attorneys, along with George Canellos, the former co-director of the SEC’s enforcement division.
Canellos, who also served at Millbank, previously served at the US Attorney General’s Office.
On June 5, the SEC filed a lawsuit against Binance US, Binance’s US arm, and Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao on 13 counts. The lawsuit, filed in a District Court in Columbia, also argued that investor funds were misused.
The regulator said the exchange “blatantly disregarded” US securities laws.
The SEC went further, filing a lawsuit to freeze the assets of Binance US to protect client funds. Binance denied all the allegations.
Adam Fee, one of three other attorneys included in Binance US’s legal team, served five years in the New York Southern District Criminal Division. Another attorney, Matthew Laroche, held a role in the same unit for seven years, prosecuting cases related to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the Foreign Representatives Registration Act. The team also includes Andrew LeBlanc, who has addressed controversial issues in bankruptcy cases.
U.S. lawmakers introduced bill to remove SEC Chair Gary Gensler
Congressmen Warren Davidson and Tom Emmer want Gary Gensler to be fired and the SEC to be restructured with the new bill. Announcing that they are presenting the new bill with the FireGaryGensler hashtag, Warren Davidson made the following statements in his tweet:
Today I presented the SEC Stabilization Act to restructure the SEC. US capital markets must be protected from a tyrannical President, including the current President. The time has come for a real reform.
New bill and SEC implications
The new bill presented is aimed at restructuring the SEC and removing Chairman Gary Gensler from office. The bill aims to tackle what lawmakers call what Gensler calls “the long string of abuses permitted under the current SEC structure.”
The proposed SEC Stabilization Act would remove Gensler from his position as head of the SEC and restructure the commission to redistribute authority from the president to other commissioners.
A sixth commissioner will also be added to the agency and an executive director position will be created to oversee day-to-day operations.
Members of the commission will still be subject to staggered six-year terms, but political parties will be prevented from controlling more than three seats in the commission.
Tether has printed $1 billion USDT on Ethereum!
Tether minted $1 billion worth of USDT stablecoins on the Ethereum blockchain on June 12. This latest USDT issue from stablecoin issuer Tether comes two months after the last USDT issue on April 21.
Tether’s chief technology officer, Paolo Ardoino, took to Twitter to clarify that the latest USDT issuance is part of what the company calls an “inventory replenishment” on the Ethereum network. However, the latest issue will not affect the overall market value of USDT. Because the latest printing transaction is an “authorized but not exported transaction”. According to Ardoino, the last printed amount will be used as inventory for the next issuance requests and chain swap period.
USDT issuance and different blockchains
Ardoino explained that Tether periodically works with different crypto platforms to help them rebalance USDT liquidity across various blockchains.
Tether minted over $16 billion in new USDT in 2023. Tether’s current market capitalization is over $83 billion. USDT’s market dominance reached new heights in 2023 as other stablecoin issuers struggled over the regulatory and banking crises in the United States.
Circle’s stablecoin, USD Coin (USDC), was on the verge of overtaking USDT as the largest stablecoin in 2022. However, the protracted crypto winter and banking crises in the US have significantly impacted USDC’s market confidence in 2023. Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire blamed crypto pressure by US regulators for the stablecoin’s declining market value.
