Hello and welcome. You are listening to Patrick Boyle on Finance, a podcast exploring ideas from quantitative finance, examining events occurring in markets right now and financial history to see what lessons can be taken away, including interviews with some of the most interesting people in the world of finance. To learn more about the podcast, visit onfinance.org.

Gary Gensler, the new head of the SEC, previously taught classes about blockchain and other

financial technology at MIT. In fact, his classes are available for free on YouTube.

He has said to the press that he sees cryptocurrencies as a speculative store value and that

he believes that the SEC should be technologically neutral when it comes to innovation

in markets.

He has said that many crypto coins trade like financial assets and can be

considered financial securities and should thus fall under the purview of the SEC. He has spoken in the past

about social media's influence on financial markets, saying that we need to update and freshen our rules to ensure that

while every individual has First Amendment rights to speak, that they're not misleading

the public or manipulating the markets.

For now though, the SEC's official position is that cryptocurrencies are not securities and

thus don't fall under its jurisdiction.

In the UK, the FCA recently came out with a ruling that the crypto exchange finance cannot

conduct any regulated activity in the UK. In addition, they posted a warning on their website

that if you invest in crypto assets, you

will not have access to the Financial Ombudsman Service or the Financial Services Compensation

Scheme if things go wrong.

Similarly in Europe, most crypto assets fall outside EU financial services legislation and outside investor protection rules.

Many viewers might think that crypto is not a big deal, just a flash in the pan, but according

to Robin Hood's IPO filings, 17% of last quarter's revenues came from cryptocurrency transactions.

So what protections are in place right now for those who put their money in crypto assets?

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