Global sovereign currencies are regulated and mediated by central banks, with significant tracking and infrastructure capabilities to allow for secure currency transactions, to enforce government policy, and to monitor criminal behavior. These safeguards do not exist with cryptocurrencies, which enable peer-to-peer instantaneous and immutable blockchain transactions. The result: participants can sidestep American controlled transaction mechanisms. Non-state actors can fund illegal operations, state adversaries can evade sanctions, and near-peers can weaken the power of the US Dollar globally. While broad-range challenges to the Western financial system will not happen overnight, America’s near-peer adversaries are testing new ways – like using digital currency – to circumvent the status quo. The US can and should respond by shutting down those tests where it can and by promoting innovation at home.