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The SEC has released its 2021 regulatory agenda and has left Bitcoin and cryptocurrency out

The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs identified the SEC’s short- and long-term regulatory priorities in its Spring 2021 Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions. However, the SEC made no mention of Bitcoin or cryptocurrency regulation.

SEC leaves Bitcoin and cryptocurrency off regulatory agenda 2021

Except disclosures relating to climate risk, corporate board diversity, and beneficial ownership and swaps. The SEC will also focus on rules relating to SPACs and short sale disclosure reform.

In addition, the SEC will focus on “the transparency of stock buybacks, short-sale disclosure, ownership of securities-based swaps (“SBS”) and the stock loan market.”

Its focus is on short-selling, a topic that has grown into a heated debate in the wake of the meme stock craze with GameStop and AMC Theaters.

This seems like a surprising decision considering how the SEC Chairman, Gary Gensler wants to look at more crypto regulation.

Gensler at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s annual conference stated:

“This is quite volatile, one might say highly volatile, asset class and the investing public would benefit from more investor protection on the crypto exchanges.”

Gensler said that the SEC does have authority with securities and that some cryptocurrencies do fall into that category, but others, like Bitcoin, do not.

He added:

“There’s a lot of authority that the SEC currently has in the securities space, and there are a number of cryptocurrencies that fall within that jurisdiction but there are some areas, particularly Bitcoin-trading on large exchanges, that the public is not currently really protected.”

Gensler pushed Congress to work on crypto regulations in May, but so far there hasn’t been much action. However, one Senator, Elizabeth Warren, has called for a crackdown on cryptocurrencies due to environmental concerns rather than investor protection.

The SEC agenda suggests it will focus on disclosure on climate risks, modernizing market structures, more transparency on stock buybacks, short selling, and special purpose acquisition companies. It remains unclear when the regulator plans to tackle the subject of existent cryptocurrencies, including ETFs.

Currently, cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are considered non-security outside the jurisdiction of the SEC, so it remains unclear which regulatory body will adopt non-security crypto assets.

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