This CLE course is designed to provide an overview of the regulatory regime applicable to private and foreign (i.e., non-registered) investment funds and the issues raised by the explosive rise of cryptocurrencies in the past several years. The course begins with an overview of the Securities Act of 1933, the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the Investment Company Act, the Investment Advisers Act, the Dodd-Frank Act and the SEC and CFTC rules and regulations applying this legislative framework to un-registered funds.

The course then proceeds to discuss regulatory and practical issues relating to cryptocurrency funds with an analysis of the recent enforcement lawsuits brought by the SEC against Ripple Labs and Tether, the NY BitLicense rules, the CFTC commodity pool operator issues, and the FINCEN money laundering concerns that private and foreign funds should consider.

The course also attempts to provide some basic background in understanding the functioning of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency keys, together with video and audio clips that aim to lighten up the density of the materials.