EDITOR'S NOTE: If the cryptocurrency phenomenon represented a counter-movement to a coercive monetary regime, one that opened an alternative monetary space to fiat and the government’s war on cash, then we can say, at the least, it’s hitting a significant low point. Furthermore, we’re not even certain that as low as it’s gotten, it’s hit bottom. Sadly, the government didn’t have to do much. It simply let the industry, meaning both its major players and enthusiasts, blow itself up. Now that the crypto industry is in a considerably weak position, some lawmakers are looking to land a killing blow by establishing a cryptocurrency ban. Others are simply looking to regulate it, which would eviscerate its original vision and purpose. It would have been easier and more effective, though less attractive to young technophiles, to have acquired private holdings in physical gold and silver instead.
Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee Chairman Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) speaks to an aide during a hearing for the Semiannual Monetary Policy Report to Congress on Wednesday, June 22, 2022.
Source: The Hill
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) on Sunday said federal agencies need to address the cryptocurrency market and “maybe” ban it after the high-profile collapse of cryptocurrency market FTX last month.
Brown, the chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” moderator Chuck Todd that the Treasury Department and “all the different agencies” need to get together and assess any possible action related to the cryptocurrency market.
“Maybe banning it, although banning it is very difficult because it will go offshore and who knows how that will work,” Brown said.
The U.S. is seeking the extradition of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried after the collapse of his cryptocurrency market in November.
Federal authorities charged Bankman-Fried with taking customer funds and using it to fund a lavish lifestyle and investments in his trading firm Alameda Research.
The collapse of FTX alarmed regulatory agencies and spooked investors, raising renewed fears about the future of the digital currency market.
Last week, the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee held a hearing on the collapse of FTX along with a separate hearing by the House Financial Services Committee.
Brown on Sunday said the cryptocurrency market is a “complicated, unregulated pot of money” and the issue was much larger than FTX.
“So we’ve got to do this right,” the senator said, adding that he has talked to the Treasury Department to do a related assessment across regulatory agencies.
“I’ve spent much of the last eight years and a half in this job as chair of the Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee,” Brown added “educating my colleagues and trying to educate the public about crypto and the dangers that it presents to our security as a nation and the consumers that get hoodwinked by them.”
Originally published by Brad Dress at The Hill
