Lawmakers accuse US prudential regulators of cracking down on the country's crypto industry

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Members of the Financial Services CommitteeThe US Congress has requested information from regulators confirming or refuting possible concerted actions against digital asset providers.

Chairman of the House Committee onFinancial Services Patrick McHenry, Digital Assets Subcommittee Chairman French Hill, and Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Bill Huizenga sent letters to Federal Reserve Board Chairman Jerome Powell ), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) Chairman Martin Gruenberg and Acting Chairman of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) Michael Hsu.

Legislators require heads of supervisoryagencies information related to possible coordinated efforts by the agencies to deny banking services to digital asset companies and the crypto ecosystem as a whole.

“Today we are seeing a revivalcoordinated efforts by federal prudential regulators to stifle innovation in the United States. The most striking example is the suppression of the digital asset ecosystem by departments,” the congressmen said in a joint appeal.

In their letter, legislators argue thatBeginning in 2012, the FDIC, OCC, and Federal Reserve administrations began a coordinated effort to reduce cryptocurrency companies' access to the U.S. financial market and banking services. Regulators secretly coerced and administratively pressured financial institutions to terminate any relationships with clients deemed undesirable by regulatory agencies. This has brought digital asset service providers into the same category of prudential regulation as gun dealers, pawn shops, tobacconists and payday lenders.

“Actions with digital assets are inherentlyare not risky. For example, the collapse of FTX was not caused by the riskiness of digital assets and related activities, but by banal fraud. Likewise, the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank was not caused by digital asset clients, but instead suggests a coordinated strategy to debank the digital asset market ecosystem in the United States,” the committee said.

Members of the Financial Services Committee addressedheads of regulatory agencies that the response of federal prudential regulators to fraud or mismanagement should not lead to a suppression of the entire digital asset industry.

Previously Commissioner of the Commodity Trade CommissionUS Futures Exchange (CFTC) Christy Goldsmith Romero said that in the department’s opinion, crypto assets should lose their anonymity, since they can be used for cyber attacks on the country’s critical infrastructure.