I don't want the SEC involved in crypto, at all.

Laws still apply to individual people even if those people denominate their illegal actions in BTC instead of USD. They're not going after exchanges or miners here.

Market manipulation isn't illegal because it hurts investors, it's illegal because it hurts the market which is important for the economy. The crypto market isn't, so it doesn't need that kind of legal protection.

Both points you make are questionable.

Hurting the market is no different from hurting investors because bad practices that hurt one investor have a chilling effect on other investors' activity. Moreover, regulators don't have to clear a "does this hurt the whole market" test before taking action. For example, I know a guy who was running a business at an investment bank and got in trouble with FINRA for trading through NBBO on a very small order (retail sized).

The crypto market has grown to a size and role that affects the greater economy. We see that in so many ways, not only due to the holdings but also because different economic participants are catering to miners and setting up payment options for holders of crypto. It's no longer a cute side project.

I do. Right now it feels like a carnival full of carnies.

Folks have forgotten the reasons why the SEC was created in the first place, probably because the heyday of unregistered securities, etc, was over 100 years ago.

While you could make plenty of argument that the SEC should do more, it doesn't make any sense that it should do less.

Lots of folks will lose a lot of money in cryptocurrency schemes in the next few years. We desperately need more regulation.

> I do. Right now it feels like a carnival full of carnies.

With people making fortunes or losing everything based on one dude's mood and a single tweet.

The SEC and other's exist because of the Robber-Baron's of old... I'm no "Regulation Hawk", but it does seem silly to allow this nonsense to continue.

Why not? There have obviously been several scams in crypto, and as a market it is extremely disorderly.

Buying and selling gold is highly regulated. What makes you think crypto shouldn't be similarly regulated, even if it's only to ensure that taxes get paid and exploitative schemes get busted?

Too late.

Why, are hoping to be able to pump and dump like old musky someday?

Wherever the Federal Government goes seeking to protect citizens a litany of intrusive, bloated, and invasive regulations follow.

This reads like something you'd overhear at a Sackler family cookout.

Surely you can recognize the benefits of government regulations in lopsided markets where small participants lack either the power or the information needed to keep large participants honest.

SEC sees crypto as a market dominated by the Chinese. They want to dominate it themselves.

Elon has become so big that anything he does manipulates the market.

For narrow definitions of "market". Has Elon ever caused any movement in the U.S. Dollar?

I'm a big fan of Matt Levine's "Money Stuff" column on Bloomberg - he always has amusing and insightful commentary particularly on Elon -

> My Bloomberg Opinion colleague Liam Denning points out that “Musk’s move may also indicate that Teslas weren’t flying off the shelves as a result of accepting Bitcoin payment,” and in fact it’s not entirely clear whether Tesla has sold any cars for Bitcoins.[2] I hope it hasn’t. I hope Musk can make the price of Bitcoin go up or down by 10% by announcing that Tesla will or will not accept Bitcoins for cars, without ever actually accepting any Bitcoins for any cars either way. There’s something pure about that: The price of Bitcoin depends on Elon Musk’s attitude toward it, not on the existence of any grubby commercial transactions in which Bitcoins are exchanged for cars.[3] The source of value for Bitcoin is not its use as a currency or economic importance; the source of value for Bitcoin — for everything — is simple proximity to Elon Musk.

Someone finally securitized the reality distortion field.

Hey, I accept pieces of paper (and now bits in a computer) for my valuable work, and bought a valuable home, car, and computer with those papers and bits.

Money works purely on belief. If we all suddenly disbelieved in the dollar, the value would be zero.

Curiously, most cycles of hyperinflation come more from loss of faith than from money printing. When people lose faith in a currency, they sell it off as a value store.

Elon Musk's net worth is $28B. His faith in a crypocurrency as a value store counts for a lot.

> Money works purely on belief. If we all suddenly disbelieved in the dollar, the value would be zero.

Is this true? Yes.

Are you wildly underselling what "disbelieving in the dollar" means in practice? Also yes.

I believe in the dollar because the United States has the worlds largest nuclear arsenal, spends nearly a trillion dollars on its military every year – and that's only what it puts on the books – and has been proven to have an itchy fucking trigger finger.

That trust isn't going anywhere without massive global conflict.

> suddenly disbelieved in the dollar

you can disbelieve in the dollar. But you can't disbelieve in the Secret Service/US military showing up and kicking your ass

Also democracy. What if Bitcoin went up to $100M/coin? What is the likelihood that both Trump and Biden are going to be like "Well the BTC people were right and now they can buy all the companies and real estate. The rest of you americans will have to just have fun being poor, there is no way we will tax BTC wealth"

> Elon Musk's net worth is $28B. His faith in a crypocurrency as a value store counts for a lot.

Not only that, but he has pretty dominating role in various companies whose market caps are in hundreds of billions at least.