US SEC Chairman Says Crypto Firms Made ‘Calculated’ Decision To Flaunt Rules

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June 8 (Reuters) – The chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Thursday strongly refuted criticism that the agency is trying to crush the crypto industry, and said many companies in space had made a “calculated economic decision” to flout its rules.

Speaking at a Piper Sandler conference in New York, Gary Gensler also reiterated his view that the “vast majority” of crypto tokens pass the security test and should be registered with the SEC. This means that most crypto exchanges must also comply with securities laws, he added.

“When crypto asset market players go on Twitter or on TV and say they weren’t ‘duly informed’ that their conduct might be illegal, don’t believe it,” he said. “They may have made a calculated economic decision to take the risk of the app as the cost of doing business.”

The crypto industry has attacked Gensler in recent days after the SEC sued two of the world’s largest crypto exchanges, Coinbase (COIN.O) and Binance, for allegedly violating securities laws by failing to register their transactions with the agency.

Coinbase Chief Executive Brian Armstrong, an outspoken critic of the SEC who has led a campaign in Washington for clearer crypto rules, hit back at Gensler on Wednesday, calling him an “outlier” among Washington policymakers and accusing him of being “frosty” when the company approached. him about the registration.

Reporting by John McCrank in New York Editing by Michelle Price, Chizu Nomiyama and Matthew Lewis

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