The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu The leading online blog in the fields of corporate governance and financial regulation. Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:08:54 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.5.8 https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/cropped-photography-4-e1706898544564-1-32x32.png The Rise of Blockchains and Regulatory Scrutiny – The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu 32 32 The Rise of Blockchains and Regulatory Scrutiny https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2018/03/09/the-rise-of-blockchains-and-regulatory-scrutiny/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-rise-of-blockchains-and-regulatory-scrutiny https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2018/03/09/the-rise-of-blockchains-and-regulatory-scrutiny/#comments Fri, 09 Mar 2018 14:08:09 +0000 https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/?p=105421?d=20180309105005EST Posted by Stuart Levi, Gregory Fernicola and Eytan Fisch, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, on Friday, March 9, 2018
Editor's Note:

Stuart Levi, Gregory Fernicola and Eytan Fisch are partners at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP. This post is based on a January 30, 2018 Skadden publication by Mr. Levi, Mr. Fernicola, Mr. Fisch, Ryan Dzierniejko, Valian Afshar, and James Perry.

In 2017, the increased adoption of blockchain technology in various industries was partially obscured by the dramatic fluctuations in the price of bitcoins and the prevalence of so-called initial coin offerings (ICOs) to raise capital to build out blockchain applications and platforms. Adoption of blockchain technology is expected to continue to rise in 2018, and the growing popularity of both the technology and ICOs is likely to bring with it continued legislative and regulatory scrutiny, especially with respect to U.S. securities and anti-money laundering laws.

Blockchain Trends

Blockchain technology refers to a distributed ledger system in which all parties have access to a secure and immutable ledger, and can transact with unknown parties in a secure manner. The system used advanced cryptography and a consensus algorithm to achieve that end. Certain blockchains are public in that they are accessible to all, Bitcoin being the most popular example, while others are private or permissioned blockchains, which are accessible only to approved users, such as a consortium of banks. (For background on how the technology operates, see our 2017 Insights article “Blockchains Offer Revolutionary Potential in Fintech and Beyond.”)

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