Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary has revealed that his investment in FTX International has gone to “zero” and that he doesn’t want to make any more capital allocations to crypto until one thing happens.
In an interview with CNBC, O’Leary, a former paid spokesperson for FTX, says that institutional investors like himself won’t be engaging in crypto investments until regulations are set to prevent the next FTX meltdown.
“Yes I’m a shareholder in [FTX] International. That’s a zero. It’s not the first time I’ve made a bad investment, probably not the last time. But luckily I make more good ones than bad ones and I learn from my mistakes. What’s going to happen now is there won’t be another situation like this for institutional investors ever again. We’re simply not going to put capital to work until this stuff gets regulated. What is occuring – and I’m just one voice in it – what I’m going to be doing, is I’m going to fly to Washington and I want regulation. I want it now. No more delaying. I think this puts tremendous pressure on the SEC (U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission).”
The venture capitalist says he’s not touching crypto again until US officials pass the Stablecoin Transparency Act, which he believes is a critical first step to regulatory clarity in the space.
The Stablecoin Transparency Act was proposed by Senator Bill Hagerty and aims to enact certain reporting requirements for stablecoin issuers.
“I’d like to start with one thing. I don’t think we can solve for every single asset in crypto. I want to do one thing, and that one thing is to pass the Stablecoin Transparency Act. One thing. Because that allows us to use the US dollar as a payments system. I would use that in all of my businesses every day.
It’s far superior to ACH (Automated Clearing House network), far superior to SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication), far faster, more transparent, 100% auditable. All I need is the regulation that forces an audit every 30 days and guarantees me the backup for this is Treasury bills less than 12 months in duration. That’s one thing, very simple.
That would signal to everybody around the world that the regulators here in the United States are taking crypto on, starting to put rules in place, putting the guardrails on. No one is going to play ball anymore in this space on an institutional level with serious capital till we get it done.”
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