Crypto Exchanges Regulated or Liquidated-Kevin O’Leary
2023.02.21 02:04
Crypto Exchanges Regulated or Liquidated-Kevin O’Leary
By Tiffany Smith
Budrigannews.com – If crypto exchanges want to “stay out of the way” of Gary Gensler and the United States Securities Exchange Commission, venture capitalist and Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary has urged them to “get on board with regulation.”
O’Leary stated in an interview with TraderTV Live on February 20 that U.S. lawmakers are “fatigued” by crypto collapses and will only become more ruthless if businesses do not comply:
You need to embrace regulation and avoid getting in the way of Gensler at the Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulators. The men in Washington are dissatisfied. The bear is awake and enraged after FTX poked it.
He added, “because they’re totally unregulated and they keep issuing tokens that are worthless,” that “these senators are really tired, they’re really tired of gathering every six months when the next crypto company blows up and goes to zero.”
Aftermarket trading for existing crypto projects is extremely discounted, and venture funding for brand-new projects is virtually nonexistent. Reason? The regulator is currently regulating through enforcement, severe penalties, and substantial fines. #AI pic.twitter.com/ChpjYIY9Dl is the next “big” thing that the venture community is interested in.
O’Leary stated that the SEC’s $30 million fine on Kraken and subsequent order to cease providing staking services should alert the industry and encourage compliance.
The Shark Tank investor predicted that over the next few years, regulated trading platforms will be better investments than their unregulated counterparts because of the recent regulatory crackdowns:
“I think the value of regulated exchanges is going to go up over the next few years, while the value of unregulated exchanges is going to go down or be zero by the time the regulators put them out of business,”
O’Leary recently admitted that almost all of the $15 million FTX paid him to be its official spokesperson was lost.
Mr. Wonderful has continued to defend former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, claiming that the controversial figure should be treated as innocent until proven guilty and that he wouldn’t rule out investing in the failed entrepreneur again, despite admitting that FTX was a “bad” investment:
I don’t worry about investing in entrepreneurs who have failed spectacularly. The best teacher is frequently failure.
The Shark Tank investor has previously voiced disapproval of some of the industry’s more decentralized and unregulated players.
O’Leary stated on August 13 that the Dutch authorities were justified in arresting Alexey Pertsev, the developer of Tornado Cash, an Ethereum-based cryptocurrency mixer, because such applications and the “crypto cowboys” who operate them “mess with the primal forces of regulation.”
