Federal authorities brought the first-ever cryptocurrency insider-trading case on 21 July, accusing a former Coinbase Global manager of tipping off his brother and a friend with confidential information, and signalling in a companion case an aggressive new push to police digital tokens.

Prosecutors in Manhattan filed wire-fraud charges against the three men, and, at the same time, the Securities and Exchange Commission brought a civil case against them in which it alleged that nine cryptocurrencies, including seven that are currently available on Coinbase, are unregistered securities.