Crypto Is ‘Going to Get Bigger’ Says CFTC Commissioner

Brian Quintenz, commissioner for the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) says the industry of cryptocurrency is going to continue growing, creating new challenges for the regulatory body. 

Crypto Industry Growing

Speaking with CNBC on Sept. 19, Quintenz told his interviewer that the industry of crypto is “just going to get bigger” and that the market as a whole would pose new regulatory challenges. 

I think it’s just going to get bigger. I think as more established companies get into cryptographic products, whether they are centralized or decentralized, I think you will see the appeal of all crypto-assets increase across the globe.

However, the Commissioner explained the CFTC’s approach to creating policy, emphasizing that their goal was to create guidelines that would not stifle innovation,

We’ve traditionally been a principles-based regulator, so we’ve tried not to be a prescriptive regulator where those rules are prescribed at one point in time for a snapshot of the marketplace and then they fail to evolve and be updated.

Quintenz said that the CFTC would prefer to put “guardrails” up while allowing the market to ultimately decide the best use case or investment decision for a product such as crypto-assets. However, he cautioned the CFTC will still work to prevent market manipulation, which the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has regularly cited as a roadblock for bitcoin gaining ETF approval. 

Quintenz said the next big hurdle for the CFTC is handling physically-settled bitcoin contracts, particularly how the coins are held for collateral. 

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