PRESS RELEASE: Industry Leaders Spearhead Conversation on Cryptocurrency Compliance Standards

In the wake of 2018’s worst week for cryptocurrency markets, Elastos, a leading web3 project, facilitated a dialogue between leading crypto and blockchain compliance experts to identify the most pressing obstacles facing the industry. The consensus? A resounding call for clear-cut compliance standards and regulation.

With increasing calls for clarity on how the emerging technology will be regulated, discussions of this nature are poised to deliver the solutions regulators and industry stakeholders alike are seeking. Until U.S. regulators form concrete (and common-sense) standards, the cryptocurrency community runs the risk of remaining in a volatile holding pattern — while the country falls behind as world leaders.

Compliance experts from 0x, Stellar, Circle, call for clear blockchain regulation

San Francisco, CA — November 16, 2018 — Elastos, the decentralized infrastructure for secure web-based transactions, organized a gathering of industry leaders to discuss the future of regulations, compliance, and best practices throughout the blockchain and cryptocurrency ecosystem. Representatives of exchanges, including 0x and HBUS, as well as compliance directors from leading blockchain projects joined to engage in a meaningful dialogue about the regulatory framework needed to foster the industry’s maturation.

Fay Li, CMO of Elastos, said, “Compliance has become one of the most important issues in the blockchain and cryptocurrency space. Every legitimate project wants to be compliant, but the lack of clarity on compliance standards is holding back the technological movement. Elastos has made compliance a priority and we plan to continue to lead on this important issue. The conversation we are starting today is representative of the dialogue that needs to take place across the world, and here in the United States in particular.”

The state of crypto regulation within the United States remains largely ambiguous. With newly elected officials set to take office at the beginning of the new year, regulation around emerging tech and blockchain compliance are likely to be one of the most important points of discussion within the legislature.

Over the course of two panel discussions moderated by Chris McCann, blockchain advisor, entrepreneur, and founder of Crypto Weekly, speakers examined best practices regarding regulation of cryptocurrency and the technology behind it: blockchain. The first set of panelists discussed their work on compliance, and the future of cryptocurrency regulation. The second panel focused on what exchanges would need to do in order to be compliant and what they look for in a coin when they consider listing it.

In regards to securities and money transmitter regulation, Jason Somensatt of 0x, said, “Answers to high level taxonomy questions around securities law are going to define how the space moves forward, but from a day to day operations perspective, you have to live with uncertainty. I spend a lot of time thinking about what the best practices we can execute upon within our company are, to at least minimize risk as much as possible.”

“This whole space is new technology into old law, and so there has to be some sort of more definitive guidance from regulatory agencies. We don’t have clarity on what that clear guidance, in plain English will be — but it needs to happen,” said Hailey Lennon of Bitflyer, echoing the sentiments of speakers from Circle and HBUS.

Other notable speakers included: Steven Nam, Chief Editor of the Stanford Codex Blockchain Journal and professor at Stanford Law School; Lindsey Lin, Counsel for Stellar; Megan Monroe, Head of Compliance for HBUS; and Hailey Lennon, Director of Compliance for BitFlyer.

About Elastos:

With 18 years of development, Elastos aims to be the first completely secure environment on the web where decentralized applications are detached from the internet while also permitting full scalability to millions of users, Elastos will allow full ownership and wealth generation from data and digital assets. Powered by blockchain technology, Elastos had an angel investment from both Bitmain and NEO founders and has been sponsored by industry giants such as the Tsinghua Science Park and the TD-SCDMA Industrial Alliance. Through a strategic partnership with Shanghai Shijiu TV, the world’s leading HTML5 and browser technology developer in the OTT and Smart TV fields, Elastos is set to reach a carrier node count of one million by the end of this year. For more information, visit https://www.elastos.org/en/.