United States lawyers and senators have called on Congress to demand an investigation into the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission after its X (formerly Twitter) account was reportedly compromised and falsely reported news that the spot Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETF) were approved.
“Just like the SEC would demand accountability from a public company if they made such a colossal market-moving mistake, Congress needs answers on what just happened. This is unacceptable,” said U.S. Senator Bill Hagerty in a Jan. 9 X post.
U.S. Senator Cynthia Lummis also demanded the SEC offer some transparency into the events that led to the false post.
Fraudulent announcements, like the one that was made on the SEC’s social media, can manipulate markets. We need transparency on what happened.
— Senator Cynthia Lummis (@SenLummis) January 9, 2024
Charles Gasparino of Fox Business said he’s been told by securities lawyers that the SEC “will have to investigate itself” for market manipulation.
BREAKING: Securities lawyers tell @FoxBusiness the @SECGov will have to investigate itself for market manipulation after moving the price of $BTC up and down following the hacked tweet that it had approved the first spot BTC ETF and then saying it was fake. That said, for the SEC…
— Charles Gasparino (@CGasparino) January 9, 2024
Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart suggested that SEC Chair Gary Gensler would be furious with the staff member responsible for the alleged security breach.
“Gary is gonna want someone’s head to roll for this. (Honestly i would too if i were him).”
Others, such as investment manager Timothy Peterson of Cane Island Alternative Advisors, claimed that the SEC’s security breach was a potential market manipulation event, which is exactly what the commission is supposed to protect investors against.
“How can @SECGov protect hundreds of millions of investors when it can’t even protect its own social media account,” said Peterson.
Today, the @SECGov showed what it does best: Manipulating markets and hurting US investors.
— Cameron Winklevoss (@cameron) January 9, 2024
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