US Treasury Erroneously Extends Deadline for Cryptocurrency Rules Commentary

by 99Crypto

The Department of the Treasury may have mistakenly extended the window for people to submit comments about the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network's proposed cryptocurrency rules. In December, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network proposed a set of new rules around cryptocurrency that would require all of the registered exchanges to verify the identity of each user. They would have to do that with a non-hosted or covered wallet for any transaction in excess of $3,000.

At the time of the proposal, the Department of the Treasury said that interested parties would have 15 days to deliver comments. They later clarified that the submission period for comments would close on January 4. An update on Regulations.gov updated the submission date to January 7 at 11:59 pm ET. This means that the proposal was placed on December 23, not on December 20.

According to Dayton Young, who is a product director at an organization called Fight for the Future, the whole ordeal is a hot mess. The Fight for the Future group is a digital rights organization headquartered in Massachusetts. young said that the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network has pushed back the deadline because government employees do not know how to count to 15.

Fight for the Future encouraged citizens to speak out against the new regulation. it claims that the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network provided too short of a time period to submit comments, especially with the time period enveloping Christmas and New Year's day.The two holidays distracted people. Paul Grewal, who is the Chief Legal Officer of Coin Base, suggested a 60-day comment period because of the holidays and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Regulations.gov still accepted comments until the end of January 7, but it is not clear if those that were submitted between January 5 and January 7 would be reviewed as valid. Young and Grewal both hope the Department of the Treasury will allow for longer comment periods in the future when additions or changes to cryptocurrency rules are proposed. They will continue lobbying for more access to law enforcement and government officials so they can share their stories.