The Federal Reserve doing what they do best; The SEC possibly making things a bit easier for accredited investors

Today’s episode will cover events happening the week ending August 28th, 2020. This week, the federal reserve did something very predictable, the SEC has made it somewhat easier to become an accredited investor…maybe. More Info @ Talk.Bitcoin.Tax Full Show Notes: (00:28) One of the big financial pieces of news this week has to do with the United States Federal Reserve. On Thursday, the chairman of the federal reserve, Jerome Powell, gave a speech at the annual Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium. In his speech, he announced a major policy shift related to inflation. According to The Economist, “He emphasized that the central bank’s existing target for inflation, of 2%, should henceforth be an average: in the face of persistently low inflation, the Fed may pursue efforts to push inflation above the target. And perhaps most important, Mr. Powell noted that the Fed would no longer attempt to prevent employment from rising above its best estimate of the maximum sustainable level.” A more traditional financial analysis of this shift was provided by CNBC’s Jim Cramer, who mused that it is “a signal from the central bank that it won’t play any part in moderating growth and will continue to provide liquidity until the U.S. economy is outperforming expectations.” And that is “is incredible”. The crypto community has a slightly different opinion on the matter though. Within the community of crypto advocates, one of the primary criticisms of traditional fiat currency, especially USD, is that the federal government can and will print money whenever they feel the need. Of course, this is not possible with any cryptocurrency is a finite supply. Decrypt, a cryptocurrency news outlet, has this to say about the unprecedented move: “Here’s what’s troubling about the statement: It’s a reminder that a small group of people has absolute power over the direction of fiat currency, in this case, the world’s reserve currency. The Federal Reserve has the dual mandate to protect the labor market and to keep consumer prices at bay. The problem is that two goals are often opposed and in a world that’s increasingly leaning towards populism, central banks will choose to privilege the job market over keeping inflation targets. This means the currency loses.” This isn’t necessarily bad news for Bitcoin and crypto though – Decrypt points out that Bitcoin saw a slight price hike after the announcement, although the gains were quickly diminished. More importantly though, they say that Powell’s statements “may prompt people to hold the largest cryptocurrency after realizing… Bitcoin has a predictable issuance schedule and a cap on the coins that will ever be issued… Any changes are made by broad consensus…[and] the price of bitcoin will be volatile because of free-market forces, but it won’t be devalued because a centralized entity decided more coins will start to flood the market.” So, is the federal government playing directly into the criticisms that crypto enthusiasts regularly lob at them? Seemingly, yes. And it is very likely that crypto enthusiasts will use this event as another one of many rallying cries to get behind cryptocurrency adoption. — (02:55) In other federal government news, the SEC released some seemingly good news for aspiring accredited investors. On Wednesday, a press released was put out titled “SEC Modernizes the Accredited Investor Definition”. This press release expanded the definition of “accredited investor”, and according to the law firm Troutman Pepper, “The new definition moves beyond the long-standing reference to wealth and income to determine whether individuals may be deemed accredited investors. In addition, the definition adds several new categories of entities that now qualify as institutional accredited investors”. The press release implies that the new definition will “effectively identify institutional and individual investors that have the knowledge and expertise to participate in thos