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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 21/05/2025

The U.S. Mint still hasn't stopped producing pennies. It minted 130 million of them in April.

JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 21/05/2025

The risk that Trump suddenly cuts off Europe's access to the Visa and MasterCard networks as a "pressure tactic" is something that Finland's central bank is preparing for: www.reuters.com/business/fin...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 29/04/2025

Funny enough, penny production hasn't actually stopped. The U.S. Mint pumped out 328 million new pennies in March, even though Trump has told his treasury secretary to stop minting them. www.coinnews.net/2025/04/18/u...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 08/04/2025

It sounds like crypto platforms are now exempt from money laundering laws. According to the Department of Justice, if criminals use digital asset platforms to conduct illegal activity, it will "not pursue actions" against these platforms.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 04/04/2025

There's more: the Houthis tapped the Tether-Garantex nexus. According to Chainalysis, millions in Tether were funneled through the Houthi network's eight newly-listed wallets to Garantex, a notorious Russian crypto exchange sanctioned in 2022. via www.chainalysis.com/blog/ofac-sa...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 04/04/2025

Tether has been allowing Yemen's Houthi movement (a.k.a. Ansarallah) to make payments using its platform, as suggested by this week's addition of eight Tether wallets to OFAC's Ansarallah listing. OFAC originally sanctioned the group back in January 2024. ofac.treasury.gov/recent-actio...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 27/03/2025

Sweden's chief central banker on the necessity of re-embracing cash as the risk of war rises: "We now need to think about resilience. If everything break[s] down, we [need to] have cash." www.thebanker.com/content/fe60...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 27/03/2025

An interesting asymmetry with respect to the Tornado Cash sanctions. Users fled in droves after Tornado was sanctioned in 2022, but last week's reversal isn't bringing them back to the mixing platform.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

Crypto ownership in Switzerland is rising, but usage as a currency remains stagnant. The Swiss central bank says 9.5% of citizens now hold cryptocurrencies and stablecoins, up from 6% in 2022, yet almost no one pays with them. via www.snb.ch/en/the-snb/m...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 25/03/2025

The stablecoin double standard: If a bank openly platformed a sanctioned Russian entity for years, cut ties, then replatformed it a few days later, it would probably face fines or criminal charges. A stablecoin does it? Crickets.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 25/03/2025

Mood in Sweden: To cope with future crises, Swedes should maintain multiple bank accounts. Own both a MasterCard and Visa card. Keep cash on hand. Pay with cash occasionally to keep the system alive—so it works when war comes. via www.riksbank.se/globalassets...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 20/03/2025

The U.S. Mint produced 353 million pennies in February, up from 242 million in January, even though Trump instructed his treasury secretary to stop producing new pennies back on February 9. table via www.coinnews.net/2025/03/14/u...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 11/03/2025

Fellow Canadians, if you want to buy 100% Canadian-made goods at the grocery store, please stop paying with your MasterCard/Visa credit cards, which are U.S.-made products. Use your debit card, which relies on the made-in-Canada Interac network.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 06/03/2025

Elon Musk has added 'expert on Canadian banking' to his repertoire. (The claim that the rules prevent U.S. banks from competing in Canada is wrong. I wrote about this here: moneyness.ca/2025/02/trum...)

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 28/02/2025

I don't know if memecoins are securities, but the SEC's new notion that memecoins are nothing more than "collectibles" that people buy for "entertainment, social interaction, and cultural purposes" is incredibly naive, even dangerous.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

CHIPS, the U.S.'s other large-value payments system (operated by privately-owned The Clearing House), processed $463.3 trillion worth of payments in 2024, most of which was related to cross-border flows. www.theclearinghouse.org/-/media/New/...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

The numbers are in and Fedwire, the U.S.'s key large-value settlement system, processed $1.13 quadrillion worth of transactions in 2024. www.frbservices.org/resources/fi...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

If you're interested in the guts of the payments system, here's a neat insight. CHIPS and Fedwire, the U.S.'s two large-value settlement systems, seem like they'd be competitors, but they're actually complementary, meshing together to create a more efficient whole.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

There’s a clear division of labor in U.S. settlement systems, though I’ve never seen a great explanation for why. Fedwire handles domestic payments while CHIPS handles cross-border payments—95% of payments settled via CHIPS begin or end outside the U.S.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 03/02/2025

Trump: CANADA DOESN'T EVEN ALLOW U.S. BANKS TO OPEN OR DO BUSINESS THERE Canada: Here is a major U.S. bank with its regional head office in downtown Toronto, operating in Canada since 1919, with 1,700 Canadian employees...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

I charted El Salvador's cryptocurrency remittances from the passing of the "Bitcoin Law" in 2021, which granted bitcoin legal tender status, until its repeal this month. The data speaks for itself.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 29/01/2025

Once they allowed the ETF-ization of bitcoin—the original memecoin—they lost the ability to deny all the others, since there's no logical difference between memecoins. Soon we'll have a Dogecoin ETF, next XRP, after that Shiba Inu, and eventually Pepe, TRUMP, and Fartcoin ETFs.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

By the end of 2024, 32.9% of SWIFT traffic had shifted to the ISO 20022 messaging standard, one of the biggest upgrades to the global payments system in decades. A key date ahead: March 10, when the Federal Reserve switches Fedwire over to ISO 20022.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 23/01/2025

A key way to speed up remittances is by giving payment providers direct access to central bank infrastructure. Wise now processes 65% of transfers instantly (up from 63%), thanks to direct access to the Philippine central bank's InstaPay system as well as its RTGS. wise.com/gb/blog/q4-2...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

Yet another crypto use-case. Memecoins as a novel mechanism for facilitating bribery payments. www.noahpinion.blog/p/your-memec...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

File this under valiant but doomed. Despite the incredibly strong network effects that cement Tether's dominance in the market for illicit stablecoin payments, the world’s largest dark market, Huione Guarantee, is going to attempt an escape by issuing its own stablecoin.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 20/01/2025

Yet another example of Tether enabling sanctions evasion. Sa'id al-Jamal, a Houthi terrorist financier, has been sanctioned by the U.S. since 2021, but even so Tether allowed him onto its platform, transferring more than $300mm in USDt on al-Jamal's behalf. www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 17/01/2025

Sanctions on Russian banks have led firms involved in Russia-China trade to form regional clearing platforms. By cancelling off payments amongst each other, firms can minimize usage of the formal banking system. The US's response: target these clearing platforms with sanctions.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 15/01/2025

Ransomware thrives on payments. The UK is finally considering a ban on paying ransoms—a move we all should have made long ago when it was clear ransomware wasn’t going away. Cut the payments, extinguish the fire. assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/678640...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

That's a lot of eyeballs on your personal financial data, assuming you've ever withdrawn or deposited at least $10,000 in cash. More than 14,000 FBI agents currently have access to cash transaction report (CTR) data. www.gao.gov/products/gao...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

Byzantine gold coins like these found in medieval English burial sites are one of many clues that Anglo-Saxons may have traveled to Byzantium around 575 AD to fight for the emperor, returning with their loot after the battles were won.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

The quantity of U.S. banknotes circulating overseas sums up to as low as $800 billion and as high as $1.7 trillion. That's 40%–75% of all U.S. currency in existence. Of this, $1.2–$1.3 trillion in $100 bills are held outside the U.S., or 70% of all $100s. www.federalreserve.gov/econres/ifdp...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 05/01/2025

Japan has always been a cash-obsessed economy, circulation of its cornerstone 10,000 yen banknote steadily expanding even as credit cards and other digital payments make limited inroads. For the first time, the ¥10,000 note is shrinking. Has Japan finally reached peak cash?

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 02/01/2025

Iceland is one of the few countries in the world where cash-in-circulation has begun to fall after decades of growth, but I suspect we'll all become Iceland in the next few years.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 27/12/2024

The amount of Chinese RMB payments flowing over SWIFT has collapsed over the last few months. It probably reflects banks switching from SWIFT to CIPS, China's competing network, rather than a broad decline in RMB-denominated cross border payments.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 24/12/2024

Just updated my chart on how to classify Bitcoin, memecoins, memestocks, lotteries, and monetary instruments like cash, stablecoins, and bank deposits. Thoughts?

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 16/12/2024

Fascinating anecdote about Tether and sanctions: On a recent state visit to Iran, Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko couldn't pay ahead of time for logistics, since both Lukashenko and Iran are sanctioned. Their solution? "Please check if you can pay tether." www.ft.com/content/b3c5...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 12/12/2024

The recent takedown of a Russian money laundering network in the UK reveals how today's launderers have "reinvented Hawala for the 21st century," combining traditional cash couriers with stablecoins like Tether. www.rusi.org/explore-our-...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

"The lore circulating now about Operation Choke Point is mostly just that: folklore and misrepresentations." This quote is from a paper on Operation Choke Point 1.0, mandatory reading now that allegations of an Operation Choke Point 2.0 are emerging. administrativelawreview.org/wp-content/u...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 06/12/2024

The Tether-Garantex nexus surfaces in a recent OFAC announcement. Despite OFAC sanctioning Garantex, a major Russian crypto exchange, in 2022, Tether continued allowing it to interact with its USDT platform. home.treasury.gov/news/press-r...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

The switch from bitcoin to stablecoins for the purposes of conducting illicit transactions has already happened. Mind you, bitcoin still dominates the ransomware corner of the illicit market. www.chainalysis.com/blog/2024-cr...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 02/12/2024

How much do regular folks value their ability to make private digital payments? Not so much, it seems, as evidenced by London's public transit users steadily switching from privacy-friendly unregistered Oyster cards to less private contactless debit/credit. blogs.lse.ac.uk/businessrevi...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 02/12/2024

Trump treating the farcical BRICS payments system as a credible threat reminds me of the overblown panic around the equally farcical Libra system in 2019. Let them build their contraption—no one will use it, and it'll die a natural death.

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 29/11/2024

"The list of people not yet sold on the idea of central bank digital currencies continues to grow. There are academics, policy wonks, cranks and, increasingly, central bankers..." www.ft.com/content/e50d...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 24/11/2024

It's called cryptocurrency, but new FDIC data shows that most Americans don't use it as currency—they mainly hold on to it for price gains, not for transfers or purchases. www.fdic.gov/household-su...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 22/11/2024

Sanctions as a cat-and-mouse game: 🐈‍ In June, OFAC sanctioned Russia's central securities custodian, the National Settlement Depository 🐁 Russia adapted by creating a parallel system using local registrars 🐈‍ Yesterday, OFAC sanctioned those local registrars, too home.treasury.gov/news/press-r...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 21/11/2024

Cryptocurrency is often marketed by crypto lobbyists as a way for low-income people to get financial services, but new data from FDIC shows that very few unbanked Americans use it, and rich households are far more likely to own crypto (7.3%) than poor ones (1.1%). www.fdic.gov/household-su...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Recently rediscovered in Japan: 500,000 ceramic coins stored in 15 boxes. Near the end of WWII, a metal shortage forced Japan to mint coins from ceramic, but the war ended before they were ever circulated. (images via the Japan Mint) More here: mainichi.jp/english/arti...

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JP Koning @jpkoning.bsky.social · 18/11/2024

A 24% increase in the average processing time of a payment between Russia and Kazakhstan won't topple the Putin regime, but it's a good sign that the U.S. secondary sanctions threat is slowly seeping into the cracks of the global financial system. via www.kommersant.ru/doc/7298966

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