Several storylines that had been long in the making dominated last week’s news cycle in the cryptocurrency policy and enforcement department. The Russian government has made another huge step on the path toward creating a tailored regulatory framework for digital assets, unveiling its consolidated view that crypto is to be treated as currency rather than swept under the rug of a blanket ban. While this movement in the direction of crypto’s formal legitimization is a welcomed development, a host of questions persists related to both the exact shape of the new regime and its enforcement.

The biggest enforcement story of the week, and of the year so far, goes even further back to the Bitfinex heist of 2016. In what goes to demonstrate the U.S. government’s prowess in following the money on a distributed ledger, the Department of Justice seized the record-breaking $3.6 billion worth of crypto reportedly siphoned out of the platform.

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Both chambers of U.S. Congress continued their educational forays into various corners of the digital asset space that have become a fixture of late 2021. The Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry has heard from Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chief Rostin Behnam, who sketched the boundaries of his agency’s mandate with regard to crypto assets and suggested that senators consider extending the CFTC’s regulatory authority.

Over at the Committee on Financial Services of the U.S. House, representatives were busy examining the President’s Working Group’s report on stablecoins from December 2021. Treasury