Rostin Behnam, Georgetown University fellow, joins 'Money Movers' to discuss America's stablecoin framework, the GENIUS ACT and crypto regulation.

Rostin Behnam, former chair of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission and current Georgetown University fellow, discussed the progress of crypto regulation in the United States. He highlighted the significance of proposed legislation, such as the GENIUS Act and stablecoin bills, in bringing transparency and oversight to the growing digital asset market. 

Behnam noted that while the industry has faced concerns over fraud, regulation would provide legitimacy, clear rules, and protections for both investors and market participants. He stated that industry players generally support thoughtful regulation, as it offers credibility and certainty, and that regulatory oversight would help root out bad actors while allowing responsible companies to grow.

Passing crypto bills legitimizing the industry: Rostin Behnam

Our next guest is the former head of the CFTC, just testified before Congress, on the market structure framework for digital assets. Joining us here at Post 9 is Russ Benham, Distinguished Fellow at Georgetown University's Saros Center for Financial Markets and Policy. It's good to see you, Russ. Welcome. Good to see you too. Thanks. So the Genius Act, are you a fan? Yeah, I think, look, I've been saying this for years. Without action by Congress, the crypto market, whether it's the stablecoin bill, you mentioned market structure, is unregulated. It's growing. It's a growth area. There's a lot of interest by retail investors, a lot of interest by institutional investors who are remaining on the sideline. And I think from a customer protections market resiliency standpoint, it is better that we start moving towards a regulated market. It's imperfect. It's still working through both the Senate and the House before I think it gets to the president's desk. But ultimately, it does bring in the stablecoin issuers within the remit of the banking regulators. And that transparency, I think, is going to be really important, not only for the health of the treasury market, but also for the health of users who want transparency and understanding of how the market's being regulated. Does it do anything to advance the debate over regulation for other cryptos? Well, it's- Because that's what you were very involved with. Yeah, it's interesting. As a former market regulator, I was very focused on the market side of things. It is, there are multiple sort of legs to this stool. Stablecoins are a significant leg to this stool. And the fact that it was moving forward, I think, is a very positive step. The next move is the market structure side of things. And as you pointed out, I did testify on Tuesday, there's a bill on the House side that has moved out of committee. So I think now the conversation has turned to market structure, which would give both the SEC and the CFTC authority to regulate the centralized exchanges and perhaps even DeFi decentralized exchanges in the future. Are the industry pushing back on that? No, the industry, I think, is supportive of a thoughtful approach. And I think for them, it's an opportunity to really gain credibility, but also get certainty. They're working in an environment in the US where they don't truly understand what the rules of the road are. I think from a former regulator standpoint, my issue was always, I don't have the tools to regulate bad actors and to identify fraud and manipulation. So I think there are two wins out of this, both legitimacy and credibility and clear rules of the road so that folks can grow and innovate and develop products. But also for the regulators, both federal and state, it's visibility into what's going on so that we can police and enforce the market. Because inevitably, there will be bad actors. We've seen that a lot over the past couple years. And we need to root that out so the good actors can grow and have some certainty. Well, I mean, Circle has made it a virtue, for example, that it is happy to have this regulation. I think it's helped since it's gone public. Obviously, the stock has soared. Is it a concern for Tether, which obviously is not based in this country? Well, I think competition is going to arise as this bill is passed. Again, it has passed two houses of Congress. It hasn't been signed yet. But this was always an argument I faced talking to members of Congress. If we pass bills around crypto, it legitimizes this industry. And at a time in 22 and 23, when you had rampant fraud, big in scale, I think a lot of members in Congress were questioning, why would they legitimize an industry that is so rampant with bad actors? But ultimately, in the balance between an unregulated market, where investors are getting hurt and legitimizing an industry, my take was we need to put regulation and guardrails around the industry. So you will see the companies that are involved succeed. They will grow because you will then have money on the sidelines that now feels more confident investing in the space.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv will do "anything" to advance EU accession talks. Zelenskyy spoke alongside Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, President of the European Council António Costa and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.

Kyiv

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Tehran

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