Bankruptcy judges are used to deciding the value of assets, but for cryptocurrencies, which can halve or double in value in a matter of months, determining how much one party is owed gets tricky, Roll Call reported. It’s an issue that could be mitigated by regulators or lawmakers, but despite myriad efforts focusing on digital assets this year, U.S. bankruptcy judges are unlikely to get much guidance, according to several lawyers who track the cryptocurrency industry. Judges are dealing firsthand with issues of how to value cryptocurrencies, and whether bitcoin can even be classified as money, as policymakers tackle more existential issues, such as which agencies should regulate them or whether to take no action at all. “For better or for worse, it is the courts who are going to be making the rules,” said Joanne Molinaro, a partner and trial lawyer with Foley & Lardner LLP’s Chicago office and a member of the firm’s Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Task Force. Alan Rosenberg, an attorney with Miami-based bankruptcy law firm Markowitz, Ringel, Trusty, & Hartog PA and a member of the American Bankruptcy Institute, notes that federal agencies and courts each have classified digital assets as currencies or commodities, which affects how they are valued and what constitutes illegal conduct when handling them.
