US Treasury Says Crypto Threatens National Security

April 7, 2023 11:00 am Comments

It looks like the US treasury just released a new risk assessment report where the report says that crypto threatens national security.

The assessment continues to mention that crypto is often used by criminals, scammers, and money laundering which makes it a risk for the financial system.

However, the report fails to mention the fact that these issues are all present with the current use of fiat currency as well which means that crypto is not actually any worse.

As a result, the US treasury is using this report in order to convince the US government to continue to ramp up regulatory guidelines which could ultimately stifle innovation and growth in the sector.

This is not the first time that a government entity has revealed an anti-crypto stance in the past few months.

Watcher.guru reports:

Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, Brian E. Nelson, said: “Our assessment finds that illicit actors, including criminals, scammers, and North Korean cyber actors, are using DeFi services in the process of laundering illicit funds.”

The Treasury mentioned in the report that DeFi allows users to transact without the necessity of an intermediary.

This, according to them, poses a risk of money laundering. The report also highlights measures to implement necessary assessments and actions to mitigate the risks associated with DeFi.

In addition, the report highlights that the US government should ramp up regulatory supervision and also consider additional guidance for DeFi services.

The Biden Administration had also recently released a report that shared an anti-crypto stance and Senator Elizabeth Warren has been promoting an anti-crypto re-election campaign.

With that being said, investors and speculators believe that such government reports will likely not sway public opinion as most of this knowledge was already common in the first place.

Still, it looks like the aggressive agenda against crypto will continue in the short term despite unpopular public opinion.

Critics have shared that the government should instead be using more resources to figure out how to make the banking sector more stable in order to regain confidence from the public.

Ultimately, DeFi services will become an essential alternative finance solution no matter what regulations are passed.

Yahoo concludes:

The department additionally called for more guidance for the private sector on DeFi compliance and to close regulatory gaps for platforms offering DeFi services.

The report is a part of the Biden administration’s efforts to enforce a broader regulatory framework for digital assets.

In March 2022, President Joe Biden signed an executive order directing federal agencies to assess the benefits and risks of digital assets.

In Oct. 2022, the Treasury released a report on countering illicit finance risks from crypto assets.

U.S. regulators have recently been clamping down on cryptocurrency businesses, with the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission taking actions against major exchanges.

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