Steven Mnuchin, the United States Secretary of the Treasury, has stated that regulators are likely to impose new restrictions on cryptocurrency in the near future.
This stance was likely a follow-up to President Trump’s comments blasting Facebook’s libra coin, as well as bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
“We’re looking at all of the crypto assets," Mnuchin claimed in a television interview. "We’re going to make sure we have a unified approach, and my guess is that there are going to be more regulations that come out from all these agencies.”
The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs is set to hold a hearing on cryptocurrency and blockchain affairs on July 30, 2019. The hearing will be open to the public, but, beyond an initial list of witnesses to appear, the committee’s agenda has not been made public.
In mid-July, the United States Senate and House of Representatives both held their own separate hearings to gather information about Libra from its project head, David Marcus. Questions covered not only the plans for libra but also the effect that cryptocurrencies, in general, have on financial markets.