Billions of dollars may be spent in the US to fight cryptocurrency fraudsters

Gary Gensler, the chairman of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), has called on the government to allocate $ 2.4 billion to the agency to more effectively prosecute unregistered crypto companies.

Speaking before the House of Representatives on Financial Services, Gensler said that the allocation of these funds for the fiscal year 2024 would allow the regulator to hire 170 additional employees in the enforcement division and increase the salaries of 5139 full-time employees.

The SEC chairman emphasized that the rapid development of the cryptocurrency industry is leading to an increase in fraud cases, and new tools, experience, and resources are needed to address this problem. «We are like police officers who must always be ready to fight criminals. It makes sense for the SEC to expand as capital markets become more complex. The cryptocurrency market is the Wild West, rife with non-compliance, where people risk losing their hard-earned money by investing in high-risk assets,» Gensler said.

Gensler is convinced that digital assets should be controlled by the same rules as the stock market. Recently, the SEC chairman said that all crypto assets that use the Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus algorithm should be regulated as securities.

Last August, the cryptocurrency community was so outraged by the regulator’s actions that users created a petition demanding the dismissal of SEC Chairman Gary Gensler. The senior official was accused of obstructing the activities of cryptocurrency investors, non-compliance with the law, and lack of competent supervision over the activities of market makers.