Paul Grewal, chief authorized officer at Coinbase, speaks at a current convention in Washington, D.C. Ting Shen—Bloomberg/Getty Pictures
The Securities and Trade Fee on Friday rejected a petition from Coinbase, the biggest crypto trade within the U.S., for a separate regulatory framework for the cryptocurrency trade.
“The fee concludes that the requested rulemaking is presently unwarranted and denies the petition,” the SEC wrote in a letter addressed to Coinbase’s chief authorized officer, Paul Grewal.
Gary Gensler, the chair of the SEC, cheered on the denial in a separate statement, saying that he supported the fee’s resolution as a result of, he argues, present legal guidelines and rules already apply to crypto, the SEC already addresses the trade by rulemaking, and it’s essential for his company to take care of management over what sources it deploys to supervise its regulatory agenda. “As I mentioned previous to the collapse of one of many largest noncompliant crypto intermediaries that value buyers billions of {dollars},” he wrote, “significant engagement with the SEC is at all times welcome.”
Spokespeople for Coinbase didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark when contacted by Fortune.
The SEC’s ruling on Coinbase’s petition comes greater than a 12 months after the corporate filed its request with the company, arguing that the “U.S. doesn’t presently have a functioning market in digital asset securities as a result of lack of a transparent and workable regulatory regime.”
After the collapse of FTX in November 2022 and the following arrest of the trade’s CEO, Sam Bankman-Fried, the SEC, below the steerage of Gensler, has launched into an in depth marketing campaign in opposition to crypto.
Within the first half of 2023, it focused a number of the largest gamers within the trade, submitting fits in opposition to Gemini, Genesis, Terraform Labs and founder Do Kwon, in addition to Justin Sun and Tron. In June, it launched salvos in opposition to two crypto heavyweights, first suing the world’s largest crypto trade, Binance, after which submitting a lawsuit in opposition to Coinbase. The SEC’s marketing campaign has continued by the top of the 12 months, with it most lately targeting one other trade mainstay, the crypto trade Kraken.
Most of its lawsuits in opposition to the trade’s prime gamers are ongoing, even its litigation in opposition to Binance, which lately agreed to a $4.3 billion settlement with the Division of Justice for breaking anti-money laundering legal guidelines, amongst different crimes.
Coinbase, which positions itself as one of many trade’s do-gooders, has cried foul on the SEC’s intensive litigation in opposition to crypto, claiming the company is “regulating by enforcement,” quite than rulemaking. Evidently, the SEC disagrees, and its lawsuit in opposition to Coinbase, which it alleges listed unregistered “crypto asset securities,” continues to wind its means by courtroom.
