The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has closed its investigation into the cryptocurrency arm of Robinhood without taking action against the online brokerage, the company announced Monday.
Robinhood Crypto had received a notice from the SEC last May indicating that the agency was preparing to file an enforcement action.
“We applaud the staff’s decision to close this investigation with no action,” Dan Gallagher, Robinhood’s chief legal, compliance and corporate affairs officer, said in a statement.
“Let me be crystal clear—this investigation never should have been opened,” continued Gallagher, a former SEC commissioner during the George W. Bush adminstration. “Robinhood Crypto always has and will always respect federal securities laws and never allowed transactions in securities.”
Gallagher touted what he described as “a return to the rule of law and commitment to fairness at the SEC.”
The agency has pulled back on its enforcement against crypto companies since President Trump took office last month and tapped Republican SEC Commissioner Mark Uyeda to take over as acting chair.
Crypto exchange Coinbase revealed Friday that the SEC agreed to dismiss its two-year-old case against the company. That same day, OpenSea CEO Devin Finzer said on X that the agency also closed its investigation into the NFT marketplace.
The shift was widely expected given Trump’s embrace of the crypto industry. The president has tapped several crypto-friendly figures to take on key roles in his administration. His pro-crypto pick to chair the SEC, Paul Atkins, is still awaiting Senate confirmation.
During the Biden administration, the crypto industry frequently decried what they described as SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s regulation-by-enforcement approach to digital assets, pressing for greater clarity about when crypto is regulated as a security or commodity.
