Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal announced that the company has filed two new sets of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to gain clarity on regulatory agencies' approaches to digital assets. Grewal made this announcement in an October 21 post on X.
According to Grewal, one FOIA request seeks copies of communications related to the imposition of deposit restrictions for digital asset companies at certain depository institutions from June 1, 2022, onwards. The request targets information from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.
The request specifically aims at communications exchanged among these agencies and between them and third-party depository institutions, including Signature Bank, Customers Bank, Cross River Bank, Western Alliance Bank, and Silvergate Bank. It also includes communications with members of the press. The term "digital asset" is defined as any asset issued or transferred using distributed ledger or blockchain technology, including cryptocurrencies, coins, and tokens.
Grewal's post
| X
Grewal shared a second document containing six FOIA requests submitted on October 18, 2024. These requests were sent to several entities: FDIC, OCC, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Federal Reserve), Department of the Treasury, and Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN). Each request seeks FOIA logs in text-searchable format for January 1, 2022, through October 1, 2024. The requesters have agreed to pay processing fees up to $100 and ask to be contacted for authorization if costs exceed that amount.
"We filed two new sets of FOIA requests in our continued effort to get any sort of clarity on how regulatory agencies are approaching digital assets," said Grewal on X. "In short, so long as the government will not relent, neither will Coinbase."
Coinbase is a cryptocurrency exchange and platform offering services such as trading, staking, safekeeping, and global transfers of digital assets. It operates in over 100 countries and serves over 245,000 ecosystem partners while managing $269 billion in safeguarded assets.
