The chief national banking regulator said Friday on CNBC’s Squawk Box: “I don’t think we need 50 regulations, but what we do need is clarity about what’s allowed,” he said. Brooks cited banks plugging “directly into blockchains as payment networks” as one place where “the answer has to be yes.”
Brooks seemed to indicate that crypto banking clarification emerging “in the next six to eight weeks” will have a positive effect on Bitcoin’s price. “It may have been a bubble two years ago, but with more clarity institutions that see this is a real thing are going to adopt at scale, which they’ve already started to do so,” Brooks said. He said regulatory clarity “are the things that are driving prices at this point.”
Brooks declined to respond specifically to the hosts’ questions regarding the rumored self-hosted wallet regulation, reportedly coming out of the Treasury Department. Brooks’ previous boss, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, openly indicated on Twitter last week that in a slap-dash final regulatory drive, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin was prepared to stifle crypto innovation.“We’re very focused on getting this right, we’re very focused on not killing this and it’s equally important that we develop the networks behind bitcoin and other cryptos as it is that we prevent money laundering and terrorism financing. So, believe me, there’s a balance here and it’s going to work for everybody,” he said.