U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chair Gary Gensler is revealing what’s in store for the crypto space in terms of regulations.
In a new interview on Yahoo Finance, Gensler says that the SEC is working with crypto exchanges, lending platforms, brokers and other industry participants to ramp up investor protection in the space.
“The public right now would benefit from investor protection around these various service providers, if you wish, the exchanges, the lending platforms and the broker-dealers.
We at the SEC are working in each of those three fields, exchanges, lending and the broker-dealers, and talking to industry participants about how to come into compliance or modify some of that compliance.”
He says that the SEC is also in talks with bank regulators and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to better regulate digital assets.
“We are also looking at the tokens, the stablecoins, so to speak, and the non-stablecoins, separately.
We do have discussions with the bank regulators and with our friends and colleagues at the CFTC because as you said and I’ve said publicly, something like Bitcoin is a non-security token and thus, send information over there, collaborate and coordinate as best we can.”
Gensler comments come following a proposal for a one-rule-book approach to regulating digital assets that will allow the two agencies to oversee cryptocurrencies depending on whether they are classified as a security or commodity.
Gensler goes on to say that stablecoins are an asset class that need regulations to protect investors against fraud.
“Stablecoins are being used as a settlement token inside the lending and trading platforms. What I’ve said publicly [is] they’re like a poker chip being used inside of the platforms. Those are the current uses…
So I think that we look at them, and we then say they’re part of an overall ecosystem that needs protection for the investors, protection against fraud and manipulation.”
