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Visa’s bid to acquire and merge with fintech unicorn Plaid has come to an end.

The financial services giant said late Tuesday that the two firms have terminated their plans, a move that comes months after the U.S. Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit. Visa and Plaid went public with the acquisition bid in January 2020.

As reported at the time, the deal was valued at $5.3 billion — and the DOJ viewed the pending transaction as an effort by Visa to “eliminate a nascent competitive threat.”

“We believe the combination of Visa with Plaid would have delivered significant benefits, including greater innovation for developers, financial institutions and consumers. However, it has been a full year since we first announced our intent to acquire Plaid, and protracted and complex litigation will likely take substantial time to fully resolve,” Visa CEO and chairman Al Kelly said in a statement.

The DOJ hailed the development in its own statement.

“In a victory for American consumers and small businesses, Visa has abandoned its efforts to acquire an innovative and nascent competitor,” Assistant Attorney General Makan Delrahim, who leads the DOJ’s Antitrust Division, was quoted as saying.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

The Department of Justice announced Tuesday that the $5.3 billion deal was off.

Bitcoin and ether may be pulling back from their all-time highs but alternative cryptos are starting to see action.

Bitcoin’s price has ridden a roller coaster on lower spot volume while options traders are ready to bet on ether FOMO.

Acting Comptroller of the Currency Brian Brooks believes regulators need to re-think banking regulations in light of the emergence of decentralized finance (DeFi) applications and use cases.

A time in which some banks are entirely composed of software is on the horizon, according to Brooks, and regulators will need to adjust to that reality.

Brooks penned an opinion piece for the Financial Times in which he argued regulators need to come up with rules that set restrictions for technology itself rather than the people who operate it. Currently, most regulations create oversight for people, according to Brooks.

“We call it bank regulation, but we’re really regulating bankers,” he wrote.

The advent of DeFi means new opportunities and new risks, said Brooks. Without federal regulatory clarity, states could create a “patchwork of inconsistent rules that impede the orderly development of a national market.”

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) can’t yet issue a federal bank charter to open-source software, only people, but Brooks said those “antiquated rules” should be revisited. Federal regulators can investigate and regulate a bank that is software-only by training examiners to read and test algorithms for legal requirements, meaning software banks can be adequately regulated just as human-driven banks.

Brooks, the former chief legal officer for Coinbase, has pushed the boundaries for crypto regulation within the OCC during his tenure. He recently issued a letter clarifying that banks can hold and transact in stablecoins from public blockchains.

However, his tenure may be coming to a close as the Biden administration takes office. Politico Pro reported Tuesday that Brooks is slated to depart at the close of this week, although an OCC spokesperson declined to confirm.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

Three interpretative letters from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency lay the groundwork for banks to become crypto custodians, payment companies and miners in blockchain networks.

A bogus video on Chinese social media has intensified a long-standing feud involving Binance, Huobi and OKEx.

Gensler has testified before Congress about cryptocurrency and blockchain on multiple occasions.

The International Business Times reports China might nationalize Alibaba. Here’s what that has to do with China’s digital currency efforts.

Gary Gensler, the former Obama-era chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, is reportedly set to be named as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission for the incoming Biden administration.

Citing sources with knowledge of the process, Reuters said that the nomination will happen “in coming days.” Gensler was added to Biden’s transition team in November shortly after the U.S. presidential election, as previously reported. 

As The Block’s Mike Orcutt wrote in November, Gensler is no crypto enthusiast — but he has highlighted the technology as one that exposes some of the underlying payments problems in the U.S. today. Gensler, an MIT Sloan Business School professor and former chief financial officer for the presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton, has commented publicly on the dynamics shaping the payments ecosystem today, including the emergence of projects like the Facebook-backed Libra, now known as Diem.

If nominated and confirmed, Gensler will take over an agency that is at the forefront of the U.S. government’s action on the crypto and blockchain front. Gensler would likely play a key role in any consideration of a bitcoin ETF, given renewed efforts to launch one in the U.S. and institutional interest in such products.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.