The Securities and Exchange Commission says a post from its X account that caused a spike in the price of bitcoin was the work of hackers. The post claimed that the SEC had granted approval for bitcoin exchange-traded funds, known ETFs, "for listing on all registered national securities exchanges," the AP reports. The post was up for around 30 minutes before it was taken down and replaced with a message saying the federal agency's account had been "compromised" and an "unauthorized" post had been made, reports the Hill. "The SEC has not approved the listing and trading of spot bitcoin exchange-traded products," the agency said.
A decision on ETFs is expected Wednesday, and analysts expect the SEC to grant approval to several funds, the Wall Street Journal. The journal describes the fake tweet from the SEC's verified account as an "embarrassment" for SEC Chair Gary Gensler, since it highlights "the shenanigans that still take place routinely in the crypto markets." The price of bitcoin briefly soared above $48,000 after the tweet. It fell below $46,000 after the agency said it had been hacked.
Dennis Kelleher, president of the Better Markets nonprofit, says it was "one of the most egregious and probably criminal attempts at market manipulation that has been seen in a very, very long time." "There's a real potential for somebody to have made a very, very large amount of illegal profits," he tells the Journal. Republican Sen. Bill Hagerty, a member of the Senate Banking Committee, said the security breach was unacceptable. "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," he said in a post on X. (More bitcoin stories.)
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