Congressman John Rose (R-TN) asked Gensler: “Regarding cryptocurrencies … I’m interested in why you have pursued a litigation-heavy strategy despite the fact that neither you nor any of your senior staff are litigators — neither your Chief of Staff nor your Policy Director or even your General Counsel. Why have you settled on such a litigation-heavy strategy to address the cryptocurrency market?” Gensler replied:
Frankly, it’s because the field is so rife with hucksters and fraudsters and non-compliant parties … This is a field where the American public is at risk and being harmed every day on these platforms that are commingling and often trading against their customers.
Nonetheless, the SEC chairman added: “We’ve also done rulemaking: one related to broker-dealers that was completed a number of years ago and then others related to the definition of exchange and the custody role.”
The congressman from Tennessee then told Gensler: “In my view, it seems that these cases are brought with an explicit political agenda, not a substantive legal one.” Gensler quickly refuted: “Nothing can be further from the truth. There’s nothing, the only thing political is protecting the American public.”
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