- CFTC Chairman Ropstin Behnam says Ethereum is a commodity.
- According to Behnam, the SEC doesn’t agree with the CFTC on this matter.
- He suggested that regulators must collaborate to regulate cryptocurrencies.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Chair Rostin Behnam reiterated the agency’s stance that Ethereum is a commodity.
However, Behnam also asserted that Gary Gensler, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), disagrees.
Behnam said:
It’s a pretty cynical view to suggest two agencies can’t figure it out and work together. I’ve suggested [Ether] is a commodity, and Chair Gensler thinks otherwise
Gensler has consistently avoided answering questions about Ethereum‘s legal standing with regulators. Meanwhile, in a 2018 MIT course, the ex-Goldman Sachs partner argued there was a compelling argument for the second-largest cryptocurrency to be categorized as unregistered security (MIT).
Behnam stated that he gets “very irritated when folks start to talk about the CFTC as a more favorable regulator” during the panel discussion hosted by the law firm Lowenstein Sandler, adding that the CFTC’s “greatest accomplishment” was the agency’s history of enforcement actions in the crypto space.
Additionally, The U.S. SEC, led by Chairman Gary Gensler, has been accused of regulating primarily through enforcement, whereas the CFTC has been seen by many in the crypto sector as more crypto-friendly or, at the very least, more open to innovation.
In recent months, however, this view has begun to change as the CFTC has stepped up its enforcement activities about cryptocurrencies.
Some of these enforcement initiatives, such as the CFTC’s recent lawsuit against anonymous members of a DAO, have garnered the CFTC the same accusation commonly leveled at the SEC: that it is overstepping the law in its enforcement efforts to govern the young crypto industry.
However, Behnam insisted that the CFTC is not trying to “play fast and loose” with the law when it comes to crypto firms, but he also claimed that the agency is ready to be “very creative” in its application of existing regulations to entice crypto exchanges to join the regulatory fold.
Furthermore, Behnam believes the CFTC and the SEC should collaborate to regulate cryptocurrencies effectively. He also acknowledged that authorities might not be doing enough to clarify the rules for the industry’s participants.
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