Amanda Fischer, former chief of staff to SEC Chair Gary Gensler, cited Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev as an example of how firms could exploit the Clarity Act to bypass securities laws, saying that Tenev described running a crypto business as “an order of magnitude” cheaper and that Robinhood has signaled plans to tokenize assets to shift operations to blockchain to avoid paying for "customer protection, SEC exams, or SIPC insurance”

Event date

June 6, 2025

Quotes that support claims

“The cost of running a crypto business is an order of magnitude lower,” he told Fortune editor-in-chief Alyson Shontell on stage, citing the ability to leverage open-source infrastructure like blockchains. “There’s just an obvious technology advantage.”

The policy expert, who previously served as chief of staff to Biden-era SEC chair Gary Gensler, pointed to comments made by Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev over the last year that running a crypto business is “an order of magnitude” less expensive than operating a traditional securities brokerage. Robinhood has signaled interest in moving much of its core business onto blockchain networks by tokenizing assets. “He doesn't have to pay for customer protection, SEC exams, or SIPC insurance,” Fischer said, referencing the Securities Investor Protection Corporation, a federally mandated program for insuring customer deposits at securities brokerages in the case of a firm’s failure. “Of course it’s cheaper.”

Fischer said that by carving crypto out of U.S. securities laws that have existed since the 1930s, the CLARITY Act would incentivize traditional financial institutions to “shoehorn” routine functions like capital raising onto blockchain networks as a means of dodging regulation and lowering costs.

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Week 23 of 2025