SEC chair: Commission will continue to regulate the crypto industry through lawsuits

What’s new? The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will maintain its approach to regulating the crypto industry through enforcement, its chairman Gary Gensler announced in a new interview. In his opinion, this approach is justified given the risks digital assets pose to investors.

Material by Cointelegraph

What else is known? The official noted that the commission has used congressional laws and other agency rules for 90 years to develop markets, protect investors, and encourage capital formation, and will continue to do so in the future.

Gensler, meanwhile, declined to comment on his potential ouster, as well as Donald Trump’s family’s DeFi project World Liberty Financial (WLFI). The US presidential election will be held on November 5, and Trump has vowed to remove Gensler “on day one” if elected.

Gensler was appointed to head the SEC by President Joe Biden in 2021. Since then, the agency has filed numerous lawsuits against crypto companies, including Binance, Coinbase, Ripple, and Kraken, while failing to propose clear operation rules.

This approach has drawn criticism not only in the crypto community, but also among lawmakers. Last May, Republicans Warren Davidson and Tom Emmer even introduced a bill to remove Gensler.

Citi: A Republican victory would be the best outcome for Coinbase and the broader crypto market

To advance crypto-friendly regulation, Trump’s party needs to win a majority in the Senate

Read more

Gensler’s critics also point out that despite its heavy-handed approach to regulating the industry, the SEC failed to uncover multi-billion dollar fraud by top management of FTX. FTX was one of the most popular crypto exchanges in the United States before its collapse in November. 2022. Moreover, Congressmen Tom Emmer and Bill Huizenga admitted that the official was in collusion with FTX.

In October, two exchanges themselves filed lawsuits against the SEC at once. Crypto.com accused the regulator of exceeding its authority and violating the Administrative Procedures Act, while Bitnomial intends to challenge the commission’s position on the XRP token.

SEC starts the procedure of appealing the court’s decision on the lawsuit against Ripple

The regulator believes that the court erred in not recognizing retail sales of XRP as securities transactions

Read more

That said, in a new interview, Gensler congratulated bitcoin on its 16th anniversary: the White Paper of the first cryptocurrency was published on October 31, 2008. Earlier this month, the official said that cryptocurrencies will not become a popular means of payment and will continue to be used to hedge inflation.