Senator Warren has called for more assertive action from the authorities in light of current industry insolvency. Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren calls on Congress and the SEC, to be more assertive with crypto in light of recent high profile insolvencies by lenders such as Celsius, Vauld and Voyager.
Warren stated to Yahoo Finance Monday that Congress must act but that the SEC had a responsibility to use its authority to place guardrails and crack down against crypto actors who break the rules.
The Massachusetts Senator stated that she has been “ringing alarm bells on crypto” and recommended that stronger rules be enforced on the sector in order to protect customer funds.
She said that too many crypto companies have been able “to scam customers” and left ordinary investors holding the purse while insiders made off with their money.
Monday’s comments are the latest in a series of highly critical positions on crypto.
Warren wrote a harsh letter to Jeff Kirt in December 2013 regarding the CEO of bitcoin mining company Greenidge. She was concerned about the operation’s high energy use and carbon emission, which she claimed could cause harm to the environment and increase the price of electricity for consumers.
Warren later called the rapidly-growing sector of decentralized finance ( DeFi) “one of the most shady parts crypto.”
She explained that DeFi is “where regulation is effectively absent” and, no surprise, it’s also where scammers and cheats mix with first-time traders and part-time investors.
Warren criticised Fidelity Investments’ plan to allow customers Bitcoin to retirement savings accounts.
Warren, Tina Smith, a Democratic Senator from Minnesota, wrote a letter asking Abigail Johnson, Fidelity CEO, how Fidelity will deal with crypto’s volatility.
The lawmakers stated that Bitcoin’s volatility was also compounded because it is susceptible to the whims and influence of just a few. They singled Tesla CEO Elon Musk, whose “tweets” have caused Bitcoin price fluctuations as high at 8%.
The letter stated that Fidelity was concerned about taking these risks with the millions of retirement savings saved by Americans.
A group of Republicans opposed to Warren drafted a bill later in the month to stop the U.S. Labor Department restricting the types of investments that 401k account holders can choose.
