Watch Kennedy’s comments here.
WASHINGTON – Senator John Kennedy (R-La.) delivered a speech before the U.S. Senate on the future of digital asset market structure legislation in Congress.
The main extracts from the speech are below:
“The Senate Banking Committee is, as we should be, considering market structure legislation for digital assets, for Bitcoin, for crypto. And that’s important because there’s tremendous confusion.”
“I remember the early days of blockchain technology, and many of us own it. Today, one in five Americans own a cryptocurrency. Its growth has been nothing short of breathtaking. But as often happens when there is an innovation, it creates enormous confusion about how the subject of that innovation fits into the federal government, and that is the case here.
“Those who work in the cryptocurrency industry and in the blockchain technology industry don’t know who to turn to in the federal government. The Securities and Exchange Commission announced, under President Biden, that it had jurisdiction over digital assets, as did the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the CFTC. And there’s been a lot of litigation, and there’s been a lot of lawsuits, and it’s extremely confusing.
“Those who work in the crypto industry naturally have the reaction: ‘Look, we don’t mind being regulated. We have nothing to hide, but we’d like to know who to talk to. Is it the CFTC? Is it the SEC? What do we do?’ This is why we need a law. This is why we need legislation on market structure. Not because the government has to stick its nose in everything, but because there has to be some certainty. Clearly, there is a turf war between the CFTC and the SEC, and it is Congress’s role to delineate who has jurisdiction over what.
. . .
“We need to have hearings. This is a complex bill. I’ve spent a lot of time on it, and it’s one of the most complicated bills I’ve ever seen. This is just one person’s opinion as a member of the banking industry: I think we’re going to need at least two hearings to be able to understand the pros and cons of this legislation and understand the legislation itself.”
. . .
“These are not issues that you raise and solve in a weekend. But I wanted to start talking about this bill, Mr. President, because it is one of the most important pieces of legislation that this body will consider. It may not be the sexiest, it may not be the most interesting to some, but when one in five Americans own cryptocurrency, it’s certainly important.
“So I’ll probably talk about this issue several more times on this floor, but as the Senate moves forward with our digital asset market structure legislation, I hope we move it forward quickly, but I hope we move deliberately. I hope we take the time to hold the hearings and, again, I think it will take more than one hearing to address these important topics – and then additional time, once we have a draft law, to annotate it, as we say, to amend it and make sure that we’re doing the job. for the American people. »
Watch Kennedy’s speech here.
