Linda Lacewell, New York's Superintendent of Financial Services, is proposing to update the regime under which licensed virtual currency firms are allowed to place new virtual currencies on her regulatory list. This is the first step in her review of her department's less-than-successful BitLicence that came into being four years ago.

Lacewell told reporters that she wanted to make it easier for firms that hold Bitlicences to add new virtual currencies or 'coins' to their existing products from time to time - an ironic statement in view of the fact that such a thing would be easy to achieve if her department did not insist on vetting all products first before allowing them to go on the market. She is proposing to make two changes to 'coin listings,' as she calls the placement of these coins on her list.

• Coins of which the department approves ought to be listed on the NYDFS’s website and the rules ought to allow any virtual currency licensee to choose to list any of these coins, as long as it gives the department notice.
• The department ought to draw up a standard form of words that any company that already has a Bitlicence can use when formulating its policy for listing coins. It wants that company to 'tailor' this form of words to suit itself (paying regard to the operations and risks that it runs) and submit its policy for listing coins for regulatory approval. This given, Lacewell wants the company to "self-certify the listing of new coins on an ongoing basis."

Comments (to innovation@dfs.ny.gov with the subject line of “Proposed Coin Listing Policy Framework”) are welcome before 27 January.