Bitcoiner needs to worry about genius behaviour

The Genius Act is a Stablecoin Bill, but US-based Bitcoin enthusiasts need to pay attention to the bill’s language as it relates to their ability to personally trade with crypto assets, including Bitcoin.

Two documents recently distributed among Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee show that Senate Democrats want to see an amendment to the Genius Act that significantly reduces user privacy in crypto transactions.

An analysis of Senate Democrats’ genius law

The first of these two documents is a two-pager entitled “The Democrat Staff Analysis of the Banking Committee on the Latest Genius ACT Draft.”

This document is filled with the types of rhetoric commonly associated with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), a ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee.

This calls Stablecoins an illegal financial tool (Tether, the largest Stablecoin publisher, often works with the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI to stop the illegal use of Stablecoins).

The current iteration of the Genius Act also states that “doesn’t do anything to actually impose basic obligations on (cryptomixers) to prevent illegal finances.”

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A segment of documents featuring a Democrat analysis of genius law.

This latter criticism of the bill is in opposition to the guidance provided by Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Todd Blanche, provided in the memo on April 7, 2025. DagBlanche said the DOJ will not target cryptographic services for end-user conduct.

But the document shows that Senate Democrats plan to continue targeting mixed cryptographic technologies, not those who abuse it.

If a revision to Crypto mixer targeting is added to the revised Genius Act, this could affect Bitcoin users who maintain privacy and employ such technology.

A letter from the Democrats against genius behavior

Senate Bank Democrats also distributed a second document on Monday.

The document was a letter signed by 46 advocacy groups and opposed the Genius Act.

Brendan Pedersen of Punchbowl News shared a segment of X’s letters.

The letter’s author argues that the genius law still allows “self-hosted wallets that don’t know the requirements of clients (KYCs), so some are not sufficient to prevent illegal finances.

A segment of letters against non-custodial wallets and genius behavior touching on KYC requirements.

If the Genius Act has been fixed and KYC is required for all wallets that contain free-standing wallets, it may be just a matter of time before similar regulations are established for Bitcoin wallets.

Bitcoin transaction privacy is at risk

Just because a genius act does not refer directly to Bitcoin does not mean that it is not affected by it.

If Senate Democrats give way, crypto mixers become targets for the bill, and/or every wallet that bill touches Stubbcoin asks users for KYC and requires the bill to be enacted by law, then anonymity in crypto transactions becomes a crime.

So, some bitcoiners could be anti-stable coins, but most of the time I’m not a bet and anti-person. Therefore, if future iterations of the bill limit their ability to personally trade, they will strive to encourage them to vote “no” for the genius law so that they contact them to contact elected officials.

This post Bitcoiner should be concerned that the Genius Act was first published in Bitcoin Magazine and by Frank Corva.