(Bloomberg) — Gary Gensler, the outgoing chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, believes more needs to be done in regulating altcoins and intermediaries in the digital asset market.
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Everyday investors are still not receiving adequate disclosures or information from digital asset companies, Gensler said Wednesday during an interview on Bloomberg Television.
The former Goldman Sachs executive’s tenure as top cop on Wall Street was marked by strong enforcement efforts against many cryptocurrency players, from outright fraudsters to companies like Coinbase Global Inc. and its own trading firm DRW Holdings.
Gensler announced in November his plans to step down as chairman of the agency on January 20, when President-elect Donald Trump will be sworn in. Trump has nominated Paul Atkins, a former SEC commissioner, to lead the agency. He is expected to significantly scale back enforcement actions against digital asset companies and take a positive stance on the digital asset industry.
Gensler noted that his predecessor, Jay Clayton, who led the agency during the first Trump administration, had filed 80 crypto-related enforcement cases, while the agency had filed about 100 during his tenure. But while the SEC under Clayton cracked down on companies issuing tokens that the agency considered securities, Gensler’s focus was often on market intermediaries who flout compliance with securities registration and disclosure laws.
The SEC has scored several wins and losses in its contention that companies led by Gensler are avoiding registration and disclosure requirements.
“I’ve never seen a field that is so much wrapped up in sentiment and not so much about fundamentals,” Gensler said, adding that he believes many of these crypto projects will not survive.
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