- Amid increasing chatter among the crypto community that the recent struggles experienced by crypto-focused banks are all part of a concerted effort by the U.S. government to cut off crypto from the banking industry, one member of Congress is making his concerns public.
The representative cited the recent comments from former House Financial Services Committee chair Barney Frank, co-author of the Dodd-Frank Act, who said during an interview on Monday that the targeted nature of these regulatory efforts is meant to send the message that crypto is toxic and should be avoided.
“In under a week, regulatory statement-driven market fear drove mass withdrawals at the few remaining banks that provide legal crypto firms access to financial services,” Emmer said. “The Administration’s demonstrated effort to choke off digital assets from the United States financial system is a lazy and destructive regulatory strategy that is stagnating innovation and subjecting American users of digital assets to less sophisticated regulatory jurisdictions.
Emmer also wants the FDIC to indicate whether it has explicitly or implicitly communicated with any banks that “their supervision will be more onerous in any way if they take on new digital asset clients.” Emmer is calling on Gruenberg and the FDIC to answer these questions no later than 5:00 p.m. on March 24.