SEC Chairman Says Clear Rules for Crypto Industry Already Exist
On Wednesday, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler insisted that policies meant to guide the activities of crypto players already exist, but they have chosen to ignore them.
The agency boss made the claims while testifying at the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government. At the same time, Gensler echoed his common statement that most cryptocurrencies, except for Bitcoin, are securities.
SEC Chair Says Agency Won’t Clarify Crypto Rules
When asked by Congressman Sanford Bishop whether SEC had any plans to clarify to the crypto industry how securities policies apply to crypto assets, Gensler responded that those rules couldn’t be any clearer.
In recent months, the SEC has adopted what crypto enthusiasts call a regulation-by-enforcement approach to manage the crypto industry, leveling crackdowns on projects and firms that promote what the agency considers as unlicensed securities.
According to the SEC chairman, all the tokens used to raise funds from the public are securities. In this regard, Gensler says out of the 12,000 tokens in the market today, only a few do not have entrepreneurs behind them that investors are counting on.
SEC’s Enforcement Actions This Year
The regulator has gone after some prominent crypto companies since the start of the year. The SEC’s actions have been driven heavily by the sudden collapse of crypto exchange FTX in November 2022.
In January, crypto exchange Gemini and crypto lender Genesis became the first victims of the SEC’s crackdowns after they were charged with offering unregistered securities to the public through the Gemini Earn product. The agency alleged that the two companies had raised billions of dollars from users of that product.
In February, Kraken was forced to pay over $30 million in fines following SEC’s allegations that the exchange didn’t register its staking service with the Commission.
Coinbase became the latest SEC target after the regulator issued the exchange a Well Notice last week. The agency claims that the company’s staking products are unregistered securities. This notice is a clear indication that Coinbase will soon face enforcement action.
