“…we’re definitely going to be the crypto capital of the world for regulated ETF funds, [but] are we serious about making America the crypto capital of the world for peer-to-peer transactions and individual liberty? We should be.” -Peter Van Valkenburgh
After Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm was found guilty of conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business and the Samourai Wallet developers accepted a plea deal, Peter Van Valkenburgh is concerned that the United States may not become the crypto capital of the world — at least as far as transactional privacy and peer-to-peer rights are concerned.
In my interview with Van Valkenburgh, we discussed how the outcomes of the Tornado Cash and Samourai Wallet cases have put Americans’ ability to use bitcoin and crypto anonymously at risk.
Furthermore, Van Valkenburgh brought up whether or not pressing legislation like the CLARITY Act, which borrows key language from the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act (BRCA), will be enough to protect developers of noncustodial crypto technology, some of which is privacy-enhancing.
He also noted how the White House’s “Strengthening American Leadership in Digital Financial Technology” report calls for the passage of the BRCA, which he said is the “best way to stop prosecutions like the Tornado Cash prosecution from happening [again].”
Van Valkenburgh added that the money transmission charges should have never even been brought against the Tornado Cash and Samourai Wallet developers in the first place, as 2019 FinCEN guidance clearly states that noncustodial crypto technology should not be classified as money-transmission technology.
“Operating a CoinJoin server is kind of like running Craigslist,” explained Van Valkenburgh.
“People meet on Craigslist and do things like exchange value, but Craigslist isn’t exchanging value — they’re just connecting people who are going to exchange value themselves,” he added.
Van Valkenburgh argued that this ability for software developers to create technology that helps U.S. citizens anonymize their bitcoin and crypto transactions without fear of prosecution is key to fulfilling President Trump’s vision of the United States becoming the “crypto capital of the world.”
According to Van Valkenburgh, being able to use Bitcoin and crypto mixers, as well as other types of noncustodial Bitcoin and crypto technology, is essential to modern-day Americans’ right to individual liberty.
Without maintaining this liberty, he argued, the United States is no different than its adversaries.
“We won’t be America anymore if we have fully surveilled financial transactions like they do in China and North Korea,” said Van Valkenburgh.
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