Beat
Money & Markets
Over 680 patent families from IBM make Circle the leading U.S. blockchain patent holder. But the Open USD consortium's yield pass-through model is a different class of problem.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The fintech's regulatory-first approach — a rare OCC bank charter before scaling technology — positions it as the neutral plumbing in a market that Stripe and Mastercard are spending billions to own.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The CLARITY Act is about to miss its August recess deadline. The fallout won't crash crypto — it will hand regulatory authority to a judiciary that can revoke it at will.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The President earned more from crypto in 2025 than from real estate, licensing, and Mar-a-Lago combined. The bill that would regulate the industry can't escape that number.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The Federal Reserve's Payment Account proposal closes its comment window today, formalizing a two-track settlement system. Regulated stablecoin issuers get direct Fed payment access. Everyone else stays at the periphery.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The stablecoin yield debate has split Wall Street along a structural fault line — investment banks want market structure, commercial banks want to protect $6 trillion in deposits. Section 404 is where the fight lives.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
Japan's trust-type framework permits yield-bearing stablecoins; the US GENIUS Act prohibits them. The structural divergence is reshaping institutional digital money design.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The AML/CFT rulemaking drew industry pushback on timing and a structural asymmetry that leaves secondary-market actors with lighter obligations than banks.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The USDC issuer is executing a Japan-first playbook across G7 Asian economies. But South Korea has no stablecoin statute, three competing bills, and a central bank that wants to lock fintechs out entirely.
◆ Nolan Pratt
Money & Markets
The $3.7 quadrillion settlement giant just moved tokenized assets from pilot to production — and the compliance moat that Ondo, Centrifuge, and Maple built their businesses on is evaporating.
◆ Nolan Pratt
