Here’s what happened in crypto today
Today in crypto, the SEC said it won’t police DePIN tokens, Kazakhstan launched its first state-backed crypto reserve in partnership with Binance, and Polish lawmakers passed a sweeping bill to regulate digital assets.SEC says DePIN tokens outside its remit in rare no-action letterThe US Securities and Exchange Commission issued a rare no-action letter on Monday to signal it won’t take enforcement action against tokens tied to Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePIN).SEC Division of Corporation Finance chief counsel Michael Seaman wrote in the letter that he “will not recommend enforcement action” to the SEC for a planned token launch by DePIN project DoubleZero, finding the token and its service don’t fall under securities laws.SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce said that DePIN “differs fundamentally from the capital-raising transactions Congress charged this Commission with regulating,” and lawmakers tasked the agency “to oversee the securities markets, not to regulate all economic activity.”DoubleZero co-founder Austin Federa said the SEC’s move “is more than a milestone for DoubleZero — it’s proof that US founders and innovators can work with regulators to achieve clarity, and still move fast.”Peirce said the action means crypto infrastructure providers can “spend their time deep in the weeds of building out infrastructure, not knee-deep in parsing the nuances of securities laws.”Kazakhstan debuts state-backed crypto fund with BNBKazakhstan has established a state-backed crypto reserve in partnership with Binance, marking the country’s latest move into digital assets.The initial digital asset in the fund’s portfolio is BNB (BNB), the utility token that drives transactions, fees, and governance on Binance’s blockchain, according to a Monday announcement on the Kazakhstan government’s website.The announcement did not specify how much BNB was purchased to seed the fund, nor did it give any details about what other crypto investments might follow.The fund, called Alem Crypto Fund, was created by the Ministry of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Development and is managed by Qazaqstan Venture Group under the Astana International Financial Centre (AIFC).“The primary objective of the fund is to make long-term investments in digital assets and to build strategic reserves,” the announcement reads.Binance has been a close partner of the Kazakhstan government since 2022, when its then CEO, Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, signed a memorandum of understanding with Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Digital Development to help develop the country’s crypto regulatory framework.The news was announced less than a week after Kazakhstan rolled out its own tenge-backed stablecoin, KZTE, on the Solana network through a partnership with Mastercard, Intebix, and Eurasian Bank.Poland advances strict crypto bill, sparking public backlashPolish lawmakers approved a bill regulating the crypto asset market, introducing key restrictions and establishing a dedicated supervisory authority.Poland’s lower house of parliament, the Sejm, voted in favor of a Crypto-Asset Market Act on Friday, sending the bill to the Senate for consideration.Bill 1424, which has yet to reflect the apparent third-reading vote in the Sejm, introduced a licensing regime for crypto asset service providers (CASPs), aligning Poland’s regulations with the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) framework.The bill’s passage has sparked a strong community response over its restrictive provisions, which introduce criminal liability for violations, including fines up to 10 million Polish zlotys ($2.8 million) and prison terms of up to two years.The bill designates the Polish financial supervision authority, the Komisja Nadzoru Finansowego (KNF), as the primary regulator of the country’s crypto asset market.Under the legislation, all CASPs — including exchanges, issuers and custody providers, both domestic and foreign — must obtain a license from the KNF to operate in Poland.To secure a license, CASPs are required to submit a comprehensive application detailing their corporate structure, capital adequacy, internal controls and compliance systems, risk management policies and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) procedures.