Gensler pressed on FTX failure, warns investors to ‘be careful, beware.’

Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler continued to raise red flags about the crypto industry, and responded to questions about whether his agency has failed to go after large actors in the crypto space that are violating U.S. financial laws.

“Building the evidence, building the facts, often takes time,” Gensler said when pressed during an interview with CNBC over why the agency pursued actions against celebrity endorsers of tokens, like Kim Kardashian, while multiple company failures happened.

Gensler would not go into the specifics of FTX’s failure, citing an ongoing investigation, and made clear he did not want to comment on any specific case. But he once again called the crypto industry “largely noncompliant,” and cautioned the American public to “be careful, beware.”

“The rules and the laws are clear, but do not assume that these firms are complying with the rules and the laws” that traditional exchanges or non-crypto financial apps follow, Gensler said when asked if everyday investors should feel safe keeping their money with crypto companies.

"This is a very interconnected world in crypto with a few concentrated players in the middle,” said Gensler, who pointed to Terra’s failure as an example of “toxic combinations of lack of disclosure, customer money, a lot of leverage, meaning borrowing, and then trying to invest with that.”

“This field really needs to come into compliance,” Gensler added. “We too have limited resources. We have a $100 trillion capital market to oversee."