SEC closes investigation into crypto exchange Gemini, Cameron Winklevoss says

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has closed its investigation into crypto exchange Gemini and will not be pursuing enforcement action, according to a post on Wednesday.

"This comes 699 days after the start of their investigation and 277 days after they sent us a Wells Notice," Gemini co-founder Cameron Winklevoss, brother of Tyler, said on X. "While this marks another milestone to the end of the war on crypto ... it does little to make up for the damage this agency has done to us, our industry, and America."

The move comes amid a wave of cancelled lawsuits against and paused investigations into crypto firms as the regulatory tide undergoes a sea change following President Trump's election. In recent days, the SEC has withdrawn cases against Coinbase, OpenSea, Robinhood and UniSwap.

Earlier Wednesday, the SEC and crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun said they are looking into potentially resolving its case involving fraud.

In his post, Winklevoss critized the previous SEC administration's approach to the crypto industry as a whole, calling for anybody involved in these actions to be fired immediately "and in a public way."

"The SEC cost us tens of millions of dollars in legal bills alone and hundreds of millions in lost productivity, creativity and innovation," Winklevoss said. "Of course Gemini is not alone. The SEC’s behavior in aggregate towards other crypto companies and projects cost orders of magnitude more and caused unquantifiable loss in economic growth for America."

Since former SEC Chair Gary Gensler stepped down on Jan. 20, Acting Chairperson Mark T. Uyeda has steered the SEC toward rolling back enforcement actions initiated against the crypto industry during the Biden administration. Republican Commissioner Hester Peirce was tapped to lead a crypto task force to engage with several firms previously targeted by the SEC and is working with industry representatives to write crypto-specific rules.

Gemini is considering an initial public offering that could happen sometime this year, Bloomberg reported earlier this month, but the firm hasn't reached a definitive conclusion.

In January, the Gemini Trust Company agreed to pay $5 million to end a case brought by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission over misleading statements. Last June, Gemini agreed to pay $50 million in a settlement with the New York attorney general's office.