Hester Peirce is the SEC Commissioner who published an official dissent from the agency’s decision to decline a Bitcoin ETF. Now, she is expanding her explanation in which she details all the reasons for which she does not agree with the SEC’s decision to reject the proposal.
This proposal has been the second Bitcoin ETF that the SEC rejected. It was filed by the Gemini founders Tyler, and Cameron Winklevoss and the SEC denied it on July 26.
The proposal attempted to address the problems that made the agency reject another similar proposal dating back in March 2017.
SEC Commissioner explains why the SEC decision was wrong
Commissioner Hester Peirce had an interview with CNBC and explained that the proposed ETF by the Gemini founders was wholly consistent and in complete compliance with the Securities Exchange Act.
Peirce claimed that the majority of the Commission said that the proposal was not consistent enough with the governing statute – the Securities Exchange Act.
“I take the position that actually the change that was before us was consistent with the Exchange Act. There’s no reason for us not to allow this product to go ahead and trade on the exchange. So I would have let it go forward, whereas my colleagues believed that it should not go forward,” she said during the interview.
Peirce explained that they looked through the underlying asset, Bitcoin in this case, and they raised some concerns about the market for this product.
She believes that by doing this, her colleagues went beyond what the statute allows them to do.
Mainly, she said that they should have only focused on the market where the exchange-traded product would be traded and not on the underlying Bitcoin markets.
The SEC’s decision was made based on Bitcoin’s price manipulation perception
This is what the commissioner believes, and she claims that the SEC has no jurisdiction to deliberate on the issue.
She explained that it is not their purview to look at how the underlying assets are actually working and they should have focused only on the market that’s trading the product.
You can watch the complete interview above.