During a Wednesday appearance on CNBC, former U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler commented on the agency’s lightning-fast abandonment of enforcement cases against prominent cryptocurrency companies for the first time.
As reported by U.Today, the agency has decided to drop its appeals against Ripple while also withdrawing high-stakes lawsuits against Kraken, Coinbase, and other key players within the industry.
“As you probably watched, so many CEOs were doing almost victory laps in the crypto world as these enforcement cases were dropped by this current administration…what did you think?” CNBC host Andrew Ross Sorkin said.
Gensler refused to discuss any specific case, arguing that “almost 99%” of the crypto field is based on sentiment.
He has added that “something like Bitcoin” might persist for a long time due to the fact that there is a “real keen interest” in it.
“If this is just about sentiment, then, generally, those don’t end up well, and most then go down,” he said.
Gensler then went on to compare the cryptocurrency sector to precious metals.
“There’s only 2 or 3 precious metals. We humans have a certain fascination with 2 or 3 precious metals like gold. I don’t think we humans will have a fascination with 10 or 15,000 meme or sentiment tokens trading over the years,” the former SEC boss added.
Gensler, of course, approved the launch of Bitcoin ETF in the U.S, boosting the level of institutional acceptance of the leading cryptocurrency.
However, he is still remembered as the nemesis of the crypto industry due to the SEC’s controversial “regulation by enforcement” approach that resulted in high-profile cases against numerous crypto companies.
