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Christy Goldsmith Romero, one of five commissioners at the
Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), said cryptocurrency
cases account for about 20% of the agency's portfolio, including
recent civil cases against the exchanges Binance and FTX.
"There's just a lot of fraud in the space," Goldsmith Romero
said at a white collar crime conference at the New York City Bar
Association. "There's just no way we can police all the fraud,
but we've got to do something."
CFTC Chairman Rostin Behnam has sought greater authority from
lawmakers for the agency to oversee spot crypto markets.
Goldsmith Romero pushed back on the idea there was a "turf war"
between the CFTC and the Securities and Exchange Commission over
regulating crypto, but acknowledged that many of the industry's
products are new and the agencies were "still trying to figure
it out."
She also said crypto companies should not view the CFTC as a
potentially friendlier regulator than the deeper-pocketed SEC.
"I don't like the idea that somehow the CFTC is light touch,"
Goldsmith Romero said. "'Light touch regulator' would never be
written on my tombstone."
In March, the CFTC sued Binance and Changpeng Zhao, its founder
and CEO, for allegedly operating a sham compliance program.
Zhao has called the complaint an "incomplete recitation of
facts."
The CFTC case against now-bankrupt FTX accuses the exchange and
founder Sam Bankman-Fried of causing the loss of more than $8
billion in customer deposits.
Bankman-Fried has pleaded not guilty to related criminal charges
from the U.S. Department of Justice.
(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
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