SEC Chair Gary Gensler mocks putting a gun to his head in response to a “Blazing Saddles” reference by Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., during the House Financial Services Committee hearing titled “Oversight of the Securities and Exchange Commission,” in Rayburn Building on Tuesday, April 18, 2023.
Tom Williams | CQ-Roll Call, Inc. | Getty Images
WASHINGTON — A revived FTX could work if new leadership does so with a clear understanding of the law, SEC chair Gary Gensler told CNBC on the sidelines of DC Fintech Week.
Gensler was referring to reports that Tom Farley, a former president of the New York Stock Exchange, is among a short list of three bidders vying to buy what remains of the bankrupt crypto exchange. Farley launched his own digital asset exchange in May called Bullish, which is reportedly one of the final contenders in the bankruptcy auction.
“If Tom or anybody else wanted to be in this field, I would say, ‘Do it within the law,'” Gensler said on Wednesday. “Build the trust of investors in what you’re doing and ensure that you’re doing the proper disclosures — and also that you’re not commingling all these functions, trading against your customers. Or using their crypto assets for your own purposes.”
FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty last week on all seven criminal counts against him, including fraud and money laundering charges. His exchange, which filed for bankruptcy a year ago, was funneling customer money to sister hedge fund Alameda Research, according to the charges.
Alameda was a market maker for the FTX exchange, and was given privileges, such as a $65 billion line of credit requiring no collateral. Unlike other customers on the platform, Alameda was also granted the unique ability to go negative in its trading bets, without having its positions liquidated.
“We would never let the New York Stock Exchange also operate a hedge fund and trade against their members or trade against customers in the market,” said Gensler.
FTX and Alameda were supposed to be separated by a firewall. But the evidence presented in the monthlong trial made clear how cozy they were in practice.
“FTX and Alameda had an extremely problematic relationship,” Castle Island Venture’s Nic Carter told CNBC. “Bankman-Fried operated both an exchange and a prop shop, which is super unorthodox and just not really allowed in actually regulated capital markets.”
Sam Bankman-Fried stands as forewoman reads the verdict to the court.
Artist: Elizabeth Williams
Separate to the criminal charges, the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission brought civil suits against FTX. The SEC in December accused Bankman-Fried of running nothing less than a “brazen,” yearslong fraud “from the start.”
Gensler said that, when it comes to considering new rules regulating the industry, existing securities laws are “very robust and strong.” They just need to be enforced.
“There’s nothing about crypto that’s incompatible with securities laws,” he said. “You’ve got just a lot of worldwide actors that are currently not complying with these time-tested laws.”
FTX was based in the Bahamas and used mostly by customers outside the U.S., though it had a small American affiliate. Crypto exchange Binance is under fire from U.S. regulators even though it operates an international business. The SEC and CFTC have both brought charges against Binance, alleging the company and founder Changpeng Zhao have worked to subvert “their own controls” to let high-net-worth U.S. investors and customers continue trading on its unregulated international exchange.
“Think about how many actors in this space are not complying right now with international sanctions and money laundering laws and are using crypto for nefarious or bad actions,” Gensler said, without naming companies or individuals.
The SEC has recently suffered a few interim losses in the courts, including to Ripple over the $1.3 billion the company raised in what the SEC called an unregistered securities offering, as well as to Grayscale, related to the firm’s application to convert its bitcoin trust into a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund.
Gensler said that over the last six years, the SEC has either brought or settled 150 cases in crypto. One of its legal spats is with Coinbase, a publicly traded crypto exchange in the U.S. that’s threatening to leave the country over regulatory constraints.
Gensler said companies here have to obey the law, though he avoided references to specific cases.
“If it’s a non-compliant fraudster, why would we want them in our markets?” he said.
The all-electric Cadillac LYRIQ was an Electrek favorite when it first made its debut two years ago. Now, LYRIQ buyers who have been waiting for a deal can score more than $10,500 in discounts on the Ultium-based Caddy.
Our own Seth Weintraub said that GM had come in, “a year early and dollar long at $60K” when he first drove the Ultium-based Cadillac LYRIQ back in 2022. He called the SUV “a stunner,” too, heaping praise on the LYRIQ’s styling inside and out before adding that the EV’s ride quality really impressed on long journeys.
Well, if the first mainstream electric Cadillac was a winner at its original, $57,195 starting price (rounded up to $60K for easy math), what could we call it at $10,500 less?
That’s a question that’s suddenly worth asking, thanks to huge GM discounts on the LYRIQ that prompted the automotive pricing analysts at CarsDirect to name the 2024 LYRIQ one of the industry’s “Best New Car Deals” this month:
A slew of incentives can enable you to save big on a 2024 Cadillac LYRIQ. First, EVs eligible for the federal tax credit qualify for $7,500 in Ultium Promise Bonus Cash from GM. Additionally, competing EV owners can score $3,000 in conquest cash.
With more than 100 kWh of battery capacity and 300-plus miles of real-world driving range (plus available 190 kW charging capability) the Cadillac LYRIQ ticks all the boxes – but you don’t have to take just my word for that.
A global shortage of qualified operators is impacting job sites everywhere, precisely at a time when demand for housing, mineral mining, and renewable energy construction is going from peak to peak. That’s why companies from Caterpillar to Tesla to Einride are pushing to advance autonomy the way they are.
First revealed as a concept in 2021, Volvo CE’s CX01 autonomous “single drum” asphalt roller concept has seen continuous development in the years since. Making its Volvo Days debut, the CX01 has shed the original single drum design for a “split drum,” with each half being controlled by an internalized, independent electric motor.
The CX01’s electric motors not only help to propel and steer the roller, they also vibrate the drums individually, using some trick software calibration to effectively “cancel each other out,” delivering all the benefits of vibrating drum rollers without the noise.
It’s so smart, you guys
It’s also worth noting that the CX01 is something of an “extended range” EV, instead of a “pure” BEV. That’s because it uses a small, 1.4L diesel engine to spin a generator that powers not batteries, but capacitors (those blue things, above right). Those capacitors can be charged on grid power (or from an accompanying TC13 trench compactor), but they’re much better than batteries at releasing energy really quickly, enabling the diesel to operate at its maximum efficiency while maintaining extremely precise, high-torque movement from the motors.
Volvo CE engineers envision a team CX01 rollers units deployed on larger job sites that could work together and communicate with other pieces of equipment on the site. The connected equipment could help survey the job site, report on the conditions of the mat (density, temperature, and passes), and leverage AI to determine when and where to compact without the need for human operators.
All of which is great, sure – but they had me at “giant OneWheel.”
Volvo TA15 autonomous electric haul truck
Volvo TA15 autonomous haul truck; photo by the author.
Part of Volvo CE’ “TARA” line of autonomous products, the “production ready” TA15 autonomous electric haul trucks are already part of a number of pilot programs on Volvo customer job sites. Being autonomous, they’re ideally suited to performing repetitive routes, dozens of times per day, without exposing human operators to fatigue or injury.
“TARA enables you to downsize and replace larger diesel-powered vehicles with a fleet of autonomous electric Volvo TA15s capable of running 24/7,” reads the official TARA release. “This not only helps you cut emissions and increase productivity, it will also help you rightsize your machinery and optimize your hauling routes.”
And that brings us to the real topic at hand: sustainability.
Electrek’s Take
Volvo SD110 single drum roller, via Volvo CE.
As we’ve often discussed on The Heavy Equipment Podcast, there are two types of sustainability, and both are important. The first is the “classic” version of sustainability, in that our choices need to sustain the planet and environment we live in. The second is sustainability of the business – the ability to keep doing business in a way that ensures the survival of the business, itself.
Looking at the conventional Volvo SD110 conventional roller, above, you can see the incredible amount of materials – of steel, rubber, plastic, glass, etc. – that simply isn’t needed to produce the CX01 roller we started this article with.
All that added mass has a massive hidden carbon cost. The cost of getting those materials out of the ground, the need for bigger, heavier roads to support the weight of the machine, and the bigger, burlier trucks and trailers needed to transport it. Heck, even the operator’s commute to and from the job site adds to the carbon cost of the SD110, over and above the harmful emissions from its diesel engine’s exhaust stack.
The CX01? It’s objectively more sustainable than the SD110 roller in every way, and does pretty much the same job.
Following successful inbound implementations in the Pacific Northwest, North Carolina, and Mexico, Daimler Trucks North America (DTNA) is expanding the reach of its electric semi fleet into Arizona with long-time associate JB Hunt.
JB Hunt will add the new Freightliner eCascadia electric semi to its Arizona fleet immediately, and put it to work delivering aftermarket truck parts from DTNA’s parts distribution center (PDC) in Phoenix to multiple DTNA dealers along a dedicated route.
The electric Freightliner truck is expected to cover approximately 100 miles in a given day before heading “home” to a Detroit eFill charger installed at Daimler’s Phoenix facility.
“This solution with DTNA is a great example of our commitment to supporting customers’ efforts to reduce their carbon footprint and work towards energy transition,” explains Greer Woodruff, executive vice president of safety, sustainability and maintenance at JB Hunt. “JB Hunt owns and operates several eCascadias on behalf of customers, and our drivers have really enjoyed their in-cab experience. As customer interest continues to grow, we are here to enable their pursuit for a more sustainable supply chain in the most economic means possible.”
Daimler is analyzing future expansion opportunities throughout its internal parts distribution and logistics with an eye on electrifing additional routes and further reducing the carbon footprint of its logistics operations.