U.S. Senator Says SEC Should Ban Crypto

WASHINGTON D.C. – The chairman of the U.S. Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, Sherrod Brown (Ohio-D), says the SEC should “maybe” ban crypto. In an interview with NBC Monday, Senator Brown gave his thoughts on the future of cryptocurrencies in the wake of the FTX collapse. 

“Maybe banning it, although banning it is very difficult because it will go offshore and who knows how that will work,” the chairman said. Senator Brown further explained that cryptocurrency has problems beyond FTX, saying the crypto market is a “complicated, unregulated pot of money.”

The downfall of FTX has certainly harmed a market that was already panned by skeptics such as actor Ben McKenzie at the FTX hearing last week:

Crypto mining uses a ton of energy (more than some entire countries), further exacerbating climate change. Now neighbors who never asked to live near crypto miners are seeing local pollution and their energy bills go up.
 
Listen to @Ben_Mckenzie from yesterday’s FTX hearing. pic.twitter.com/EKSFBjaYZc

— Senator Tina Smith (@SenTinaSmith) December 15, 2022

In the wake of the FTX demise former CEO, Sam Bankman-Fried, has been arrested in the Bahamas and is currently being held in prison. He is set to be tried for eight counts of criminal misconduct which lead to the loss of $1 billion of investor funds in November.