Ikenomic Insights

(Originally published at Forbes .) When businesses operate in transparent, predictable environments and have new markets to tap or efficiencies to extract, investment and game-changing innovations are sure to follow. That, in a nutshell, explains why we have witnessed a broad, mainstream embrace of cryptocurrencies and other blockchain technologies in 2025.  Innovation is essential to economic growth; investment is the lifeblood of innovation; and policy clarity is crucial to identifying and estimating the value of the risks and rewards of investment. For years, legal uncertainty presented a very high barrier to institutional use of cryptocurrencies for financial transaction settlement. Firms could not reliably determine whether a token was a security, a commodity, or something else. Nor could they be sure which agency would enforce the rules. That ambiguity deterred “on-chain” innovation.  But recent legislation signed into law and an energized Securities and Exchange Commi...

  Financial innovation is well underway. So is the race among countries to attract the entrepreneurs and investment that will yield practical, timesaving, commercial applications of a diversity of blockchain technologies. Thanks to legislation signed into law a few months ago and a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) refreshingly committed to clarifying and optimizing the U.S. regulatory landscape, much of that innovation will take place in the United States. Last month, the SEC introduced “ Project Crypto ,” an initiative aimed at modernizing securities rules to better accommodate on-chain markets and tokenized securities. Its goals include clarifying how securities laws apply to cryptocurrencies, creating space for trading tokenized securities, facilitating the development of custody and intermediation models for trading tokenized assets, and ensuring investor protections. Right on cue , Ripple Labs (a blockchain platform with a digital currency called XRP), DBS (a digit...

(Originally published at Forbes ) Who will be fired when President Trump learns his own administration is subverting his promise to achieve U.S global  energy dominance ? On January 20, Trump lifted the Biden administration’s liquified natural gas (LNG)   export licensing ban as a crucial first step toward “ Unleashing American Energy .” Yet, the current Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), running with a Biden administration initiative undertaken to please organized labor , has determined that the best policy response to China’s state-support for its shipbuilding and maritime industries includes imposing hefty port fees on Chinese vessels that call on U.S. ports. It won’t be long before a White House advisor informs the president that there is no discernible difference between those fees and Biden’s LNG export licensing ban in terms of the adverse impact on America’s energy sector. Beginning next month, the new port usage fees will be imposed on Chinese container...