Weekly Roundup

Missing Crypto Tax Rules: The Treasury Department has yet to follow through on a tax crackdown after Congress approved new rules nearly two years ago making it easier for the IRS to determine how much money people make trading virtual currencies. A Treasury spokesperson ensured that the department works diligently to finalize and implement these regulations.

Single-Stock ETFs: An advisory group to the SEC is pushing single-stock ETFs to change their names to help differentiate different types of exchange traded products. The IAC has noted that changing the name of single-stock ETFs may also serve other policy goals, such as separating them from index ETFS for insider trading screens.

Credit Suisse Fine: Credit Suisse will pay a $900,000 fine after FINRA found the brokerage reported debt trades late and misapplied key indicators to multiple transactions. Credit Suisse reported about 9,000 trades late to its Trace system and, due to coding errors, also mislabeled a key pricing indicator on 514,000 Trace reports involving US Treasury securities.

Robinhood Layoffs: Robinhood Markets is cutting 7% of its full-time staff in its third round of layoffs due to a slowdown in customer trading activity.  CFO Jason Warnick said in an internal company message that the layoffs are to “adjust to volumes and to better align team structures.”

Painting IPO: Artex, the world’s first and only blockchain based art investment platform, is set to publicly list a portrait by British painter Francis Bacon  Shares of the portrait will sell for around $100 a piece this summer, roughly $55 million in total.

AI Public Work Group: The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is launching a public working group on generative AI to help assess new opportunities and develop guidance to confront risks. The group will pull expertise from both the private and public sectors.

Betterment Survey: A survey from digital financial advisor Betterment found that despite market instability, retail investors are optimistic about their financial futures. The report tracked the data of 1,200 retail investors across four generations, examining current mindsets, investing behaviors, and expectations for the future.

23-hour Corporate Bond Trading: Cboe Global Markets announced plans to expand its corporate bond index offering with new options on futures. CBOE will also extend trading for IBHY and IBIG futures to 23-hour hours Monday through Friday to “help enable investors to more efficiently manage positions around the clock.”

New AI Investment Platform: Fintech-Adtech hybrid Invest Inc. launched a machine-learning investment platformthat “provides retail investors with AI-driven, personalized, institutional-quality market insights and tools for making well-informed investment decisions.”

 

In the Mix: This Week’s Top FinTech Thought Leader

  • Maxine Waters, California Rep., is asking federal regulators to submit written commentary on the House Republicans’ recently floated cryptocurrency framework. In a letter to SEC Chair Gary Gensler, Waters asked him to outline how the proposal would impact the SEC’s existing authorities.

  • Dan Ives, Wedbush Managing Director, Equity Research, spoke with CNBC’s ”Squawk Box Asia” about the future of AI. He views AI as “the fourth industrial revolution,” and compared it to the invention of the internet and the iPhone. “I think this is really transformational changes to technology that I think would change the tech space for the next 20-30 years. I think we are just starting what we believe is the start of a new tech bull market, despite many of the bears continuing to really being skeptical,” he said.

  • Steve Chappell, Global Head of Trading Systems Development at VectorVest, spoke with Traders Magazineabout the importance of investor education when promoting financial literacy. He discussed common investor pitfalls, trading methodology, potential risks, and more.

  • Tristan Harris, Co-Founder of the Center for Humane Technology, talked to NPR about his recent meeting with President Biden where the two discussed ways to regulate artificial intelligence. “I don’t want to alarm people, but I do think that we have to have an honest assessment of the risk so that we can take the actions that are necessary to lower that risk,” Harris said. “I do think the stakes of this are incredibly high, and that’s why I think people should be calling their members of Congress to advocate for the need to get this international regulation in place and these guardrails.