Everyone is building non-dollar stablecoins. But data shows that compared to USD-denominated stablecoins, almost no one is using them.
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CFTC Sues Minnesota, Governor Walz over Prediction Markets Ban
The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), under Chair Michael Selig, has filed a lawsuit against the state of Minnesota and its officials after lawmakers passed a bill “prohibiting prediction markets-related activities.”
In a Tuesday filing in the US District Court for the District of Minnesota, the CFTC said that Minnesota, Governor Tim Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison and the state’s director of the department of public safety, Jon Anglin, had passed the “first outright ban” on prediction markets in the country with Senate File (SF) 4760.
Signed into law by Walz on Monday, the bill amended Minnesota’s statutes to prohibit advertising, creating, operating or otherwise facilitating prediction market platforms, effectively banning them in the state. The law, set to go into effect on Aug. 1, specifically said that the event contracts on prediction markets platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket, including sporting events, military conflicts and weather were effectively “wagers” and therefore prohibited.
Source: CFTC
The CFTC claims in its lawsuit that it has “exclusive jurisdiction” to oversee prediction markets under the Commodity Exchange Act. The commodities regulator asked a court to “preliminarily and permanently” block the Minnesota law based on the legal premise that event contracts on the platforms were “swaps” to be regulated exclusively by the CFTC.
“If permitted to go into effect, Minnesota law will criminalize exchanges that the Commission has expressly approved, as well as event contracts that have been self-certified to the Commission and that the Commission has permitted to be listed,” said the lawsuit. “These consequences directly harm the federal government’s legally protected interest in enforcing federal law.”
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Selig, who currently serves as the sole commissioner in the absence of nominations from US President Donald Trump, has repeatedly claimed that state-level actions against prediction market platforms would be challenged in court. Lawmakers have pressed Trump to nominate additional commissioners to form a five-person bipartisan panel at the CFTC, but the president had not announced any picks as of Tuesday.
Several state authorities have filed complaints challenging prediction market platforms’ activities, specifically alleging illegal sports betting and other prohibited actions, but Minnesota’s law appeared to be the first outright ban passed by lawmakers. The CFTC has recently sided with Kalshi in a state-level action filed in Ohio, as well as against authorities in Connecticut, Illinois, and New York over similar actions against prediction markets.
Source: Michael Selig
Cointelegraph sought comment from Polymarket but did not receive an immediate response. A Kalshi spokesperson said that the Minnesota law was “unenforceable” and a “blatant violation of the constitution and federal law.”
Minnesota passing other laws covering crypto users, investors
On Friday, Walz signed a bill into law permitting Minnesota-based banking institutions and credit unions to offer and perform “certain virtual-currency custody services.” Like the prediction markets ban, the law is set to go into effect on Aug. 1.
Minnesota lawmakers also worked to ban crypto kiosks and ATMs across the state in response to incidents of residents being scammed. Walz signed the bill into law on May 5.
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SEC Preparing ‘Innovation Exemption’ Framework for Tokenized Stock Trading
The SEC is developing a new regulatory framework that would allow digital versions of publicly traded securities to trade on blockchain networks in the US.
The SEC is preparing to introduce an ‘innovation exemption’ that would create a new framework for blockchain-based tokenized stock trading in the United States, according to reporting from WatcherGuru. The proposal would permit digital versions of publicly traded securities to trade on blockchain networks, expanding investor access to US stock exposure through tokenized assets. The plan could be released as soon as this week.
The framework forms part of the Trump administration’s broader effort to loosen restrictions around crypto markets. It would establish a clearer regulatory pathway for the SEC to oversee tokenized securities trading on US blockchain networks, marking a significant shift in how digital asset versions of traditional stocks are regulated.
The development signals potential expansion of tokenized finance infrastructure within the existing US regulatory structure, allowing institutional and retail investors to trade blockchain-based representations of publicly traded company shares.
Sources: WatcherGuru
This article was produced with the help of AI flows.
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Bitcoin Becomes Lifeline For Activists As HRF Unveils ‘Bitcoin For Nonprofits’ Guide
The Human Rights Foundation’s Freedom Tech program released a new playbook for movements that are learning to rely on Bitcoin when hostile governments weaponize banks and payment networks against them.
Titled “Bitcoin for Nonprofits: A Guide To Help Your Movement Achieve Financial Freedom,” the publication targets civil society organizations, grassroots groups, and activist networks that face frozen accounts, blocked wires, and weaponized compliance as part of everyday operations. It lays out a practical model for treating Bitcoin not as a speculative asset, but as parallel financial infrastructure when traditional rails fall under state control.
The guide, shared with Bitcoin Magazine, opens with the now‑familiar pattern of financial repression. Bank accounts for opposition groups are shut without warning. Foreign donations are rejected or stalled in opaque “review.”
HRF guide details
Currency crises in places like Venezuela, Turkey, and Nigeria erase savings and turn local treasuries into fast‑melting ice cubes. In this environment, the guide argues, many nonprofits discover that their main constraint is no longer donor interest or operational capacity, but the way money moves through centralized, surveilled systems.
The bulk of the document is an operations manual for that new reality. It walks readers through Bitcoin basics — how the network is secured by miners rather than banks, why its fixed 21 million supply matters in high‑inflation economies, and what makes it different from company‑run cryptocurrencies or bank‑dependent stablecoins.
The guide presents those distinctions through a political lens: in a crunch, assets that sit on top of bank accounts and regulated issuers can be frozen or reprogrammed; bitcoin held in self‑custody, by design, cannot.
From there, the focus shifts to how nonprofits can actually use this in the field. Detailed sections describe how to set up wallets, safeguard recovery phrases, and combine “hot” mobile wallets with “cold” hardware devices so that small operational balances stay accessible while larger treasuries remain offline.
The authors push strongly toward self‑custody and away from custodial exchanges, stressing that an organization does not gain much by moving to Bitcoin if it still leaves its keys with an intermediary inside the same jurisdiction it fears.
Multisignature setups are another central theme. Rather than putting full control of the treasury in one person’s hands, the guide recommends 2‑of‑3 or 3‑of‑5 multisig arrangements that require several keyholders to sign before funds can move.
That structure is presented as protection against arrest, coercion, and simple loss: if one hardware wallet is confiscated or a staffer disappears, the rest of the team can still recover funds and keep operating.
The guide also digs into on‑ and off‑ramp design, a pain point for many movements. It outlines how nonprofits can blend centralized exchanges, peer‑to‑peer marketplaces, Bitcoin ATMs, voucher systems, and local brokers to move between bitcoin and local currencies while managing surveillance and counterparty risk.
Case studies show how that patchwork already works in practice, from evacuation support in war zones to women’s education initiatives where participants are barred from holding bank accounts.
On top of the base layer, the text profiles an emerging ecosystem of tools that target hostile or fragile environments. Lightning wallets enable instant, low‑fee micro‑donations, useful for global crowdfunding during protests or crackdowns.
Sidechains such as Liquid offer cheaper, more private transfers with federation tradeoffs that some groups accept for specific flows. Chaumian ecash projects, including Fedi and Cashu, introduce near‑cash privacy and simple UX for small balances, giving donors and recipients another option when linking identities to financial activity carries real risk.
The publication does not gloss over Bitcoin’s downsides. It flags volatility, legal gray zones, self‑custody failures, internal governance breakdowns, and reputational attacks as material risks that nonprofits must plan for rather than ignore. To address them, it recommends conservative treasury allocations, slow rollout, strict key‑management discipline, and clear roles inside organizations, along with selective use of stablecoins or fiat rails where short‑term price stability and regulatory clarity matter more than censorship resistance.
You can read the full guide here.