Facebook’s crypto chief David Marcus faced skepticism Wednesday from lawmakers at a House Financial Services Committee hearing on the company’s plans for the digital currency Libra. The hearing’s tone was far more harsh than the one Marcus testified at Tuesday before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs. Several members of congress on the committee expressed skepticism over ... Read more »

House lawmakers on Wednesday questioned how and why Facebook plans to enter the financial services industry and raised doubts about the viability and safety of the company’s proposed cryptocurrency payments system. Members of a House panel grilled Facebook’s lead on Project Libra about concerns spanning from financial systemic risk and data privacy to core questions about what kind of product the ... Read more »

In one of the clearest signs of marijuana reform's growing momentum on Capitol Hill, a Republican-controlled Senate committee has scheduled a hearing for next week that will examine cannabis businesses' lack of access to banking services. The formal discussion in the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs on Tuesday comes as legislation aimed at resolving the marijuana industry's f... Read more »

A key U.S. Senate panel will meet next week to consider steps that could make it easier for marijuana companies to obtain banking services, a move that could pave the way for crucial MJ reform. The July 23 Senate Banking Committee hearing – which took industry officials by surprise – includes Sens. Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat, and Cory Gardner, a Republican from Colorado. Both are backing the... Read more »

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has a list of red flags ahead of the launch of Facebook’s global cryptocurrency. “Libra raises serious concerns regarding privacy, money laundering, consumer protection, financial stability,” Powell said in front of a Congressional committee Wednesday. “These are concerns that should be thoroughly and publicly addressed.” The Fed chair fielded multiple questi... Read more »

The Federal Reserve has set up a working group to evaluate Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency, Chairman Jerome Powell told the House Financial Services Committee during his testimony Wednesday. Since it was announced three weeks ago, Libra has come under increasing regulatory scrutinyaround the world. Many fear it could quickly become a universally accepted form of payment at a time when cryptocurre... Read more »

At a hearing on marijuana Wednesday, no one on the House subcommittee who helps write the criminal code spoke out in clear support of continuing the prohibition that has been part of federal law for decades. “Personally I believe cannabis use in most cases is ill advised, but many things are ill advised that should not be illegal,” said California Republican Rep. Tom McClintock, the panel's acting... Read more »

Rep. Steve Stivers (R-Ohio) is pushing back against critics who claim that marijuana legalization will make cannabis more accessible, and therefore, more widely used and misused. Stivers has teamed up with Rep. Ed Perlmutter (D-Colo.) on a bipartisan marijuana banking bill that would prevent federal regulators from punishing financial institutions who serve cannabis businesses operating legally un... Read more »

The United States House of Representatives has pushed for more marijuana reform in 2019 than in any prior year, and just approved a bipartisan measure that protects all state pot programs from federal interference. On June 20, House members voted in favor of prohibiting the Department of Justice from using funds to prevent any American state, territory and Washington, D.C., from approving and impl... Read more »

Governor Gretchen Whitmer is the latest Michigan official to join in national bipartisan support for federal legislation that would make it easier for state-licensed marijuana businesses to bank their money. Whitmer added her signature to a letter signed by 19 governors calling on Congress to pass the Secure and Fair Enforcement (SAFE) Banking Act. “Michiganders turned out in historic numbers in t... Read more »