Conceptualizing the Regulation of Virtual Currencies and Providers: Friction Points in State and Federal Approaches to Regulating Providers of Payments Execution and Custody Services and Products in the United States

This essay evaluates the state of regulation by the United States government and State legislatures of participants in emerging virtual-currency businesses. It points to friction points as both the federal government and the States experiment with their own regulatory authority over virtual-currency businesses and provides a taxonomy of differing approaches to regulating such businesses. The essay takes the position that the States need to act in the near term if they wish to maintain their longstanding role as regulators of non-depository providers of financial products and services—or they risk being preempted by Congress or federal regulatory actions. This essay also suggests that regulating providers of virtual-currency products and services is a course preferable to regulating the products and services themselves