Joseph Lubin, co-founder of Ethereum, says the crypto ecosystem is “better and stronger than ever.” He believes that “more clarity” from regulators would be helpful for the crypto industry.” I think our industry suffers from having two major factions combined into one: the money-crypto faction … and the tech-crypto faction,” he explained.
Ethereum co-founder talks about the crypto ecosystem, regulation
”
Ethereum co-founder Joseph Rubin discussed the state of the crypto ecosystem, regulation, and whether Ether (ETH) is a security in an interview with CNBC last Wednesday.
“The strength of the ecosystem has never been better,” he said. There are certainly headwinds [microeconomic and financial headwinds] in the world,” he noted, noting the “banking problem for a few companies” in the crypto space, but emphasizing: “The scale of the conferences being held in Paris, Denver and Los Angeles has never been greater.” The co-founder of Ethereum added:
Once the builders come into our ecosystem and essentially build an alternative economy, they don’t leave. Speculators come in and go out, but building has never been better.
Commenting on why the price of bitcoin and ether is rising, he said: “It’s sound.” Bitcoin is sound money. Ether is ultrasonic money. The development, use cases, usability and scalability in the ethereum ecosystem has never been better. It is accelerating. Lubin also noted that the possibility that the Federal Reserve will not raise interest rates very aggressively in the future is a factor that is driving up the price of cryptocurrencies.” It’s an inflation hedge, he stressed.”
Regarding cryptocurrency regulation and aggressive enforcement actions by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the co-founder of Ethereum opined:
I think it would be beneficial to our industry to have more clarity and more clarity. I think our industry suffers from having two major factions that are all in one. The Money Crypto faction… And the techcrypto faction is just building the infrastructure for decentralized protocols.
Money crypto should definitely be regulated,” noting that “Money crypto people have issued tokens that are rightly considered securities,” while arguing: “Tech crypto people are just techies. They are just building an infrastructure that the traditional economy can use and that our economy can use, they don’t want to regulate innovation.”
Is Ether a security?
Rubin also commented on regulators claiming ether is a security. Responding to the New York Attorney General’sassertion in his lawsuit against crypto exchange Kucoin that ETHis a security, the Ethereum co-founder said: “Anyone can say anything, but that does not make it true.”
SEC Chairman Gary Gensler has stated many times that all crypto tokens are securities, except Bitcoin.” Because there is a group in the middle and the public expects profits based on that group.” And Lubin argued:
People buy barrels of oil with the expectation of profit.
The ethereum co-founder was asked if he was sure ether was not a security, to which he replied: “I don’t think it makes sense to speculate on something that is extremely unlikely.”
There is disagreement among U.S. regulators as to whether ether should be classified as a security; SEC Chairman Genslerbelieves that ETHis a security, while the chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has stated multiple stated on multiple occasions. However, both regulators agree that Bitcoin is a commodity.
Image credit:: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Wiki Commons.
