Gensler’s approach toward crypto appears skewed as criticisms mount

Since taking over at the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), chairman Gary Gensler has repeatedly been referred to as the “bad cop” of the digital asset industry. To this point, over the past 18 months, Gensler has taken an extremely hard-nosed approach toward the crypto market, handing out numerous fines and enforcing stringent policies to make industry players comply with regulations.

However, despite his aggressive crypto regulatory stance, Gensler, for the most part, has remained mum about several key issues that digital asset proponents have been talking about for a long time. For example, the SEC has still failed to clarify which cryptocurrencies can be considered securities, stating time and again that most cryptocurrencies in the market today could be classified as such.

Gensler has also noted previously that there already exists a plethora of laws offering enough clarity in regard to the regulation of the crypto market. In a recent interview with Bloomberg, said that for crypto investors to get the protections they deserve, intermediaries such as crypto trading and lending platforms need to align with the compliance requirement set forth by the SEC:

“Nothing about the crypto markets is incompatible with the securities laws. Investors have benefitted from nearly 90 years of well-crafted protections that provide investors the disclosure they need and that guard against misconduct like misappropriation of customer assets, fraud, manipulation, front-running, wash sales, and other conflicts of interest that harm investors and market integrity.”

Since April 2021, Gensler has fined a series of crypto companies and promoters for securities violations, with companies like BlockFi having to cough up as much as $100 million in penalties for registration failures.

Similarly, in July, the SEC filed an insider-trading lawsuit against a former Coinbase employee, claiming that a total of seven crypto assets being offered by the trading platform were unregistered securities. Not only that, as per public filings, the agency is reportedly scrutinizing the various processes employed by Coinbase in terms of choosing which cryptocurrencies to offer its clients.

Critics continue to take aim at Gensler 

Since becoming the head of the SEC, criticisms surrounding Gensler’s seemingly aggressive approach toward crypto regulation have ramped up quite a lot. For example, late last year, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong revealed that the SEC had…