February 19, 2026
“Any authorities response to Bitcoin’s latest crash should be centered round bolstering safeguards for particular person crypto holders.”
“American taxpayers shouldn’t be on the hook for billionaire crypto buyers.”
Washington, D.C. – Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Rating Member of the Senate Banking, Housing, and City Affairs Committee, despatched a letter to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, urging them for written affirmation that neither the Division of the Treasury (Treasury) nor the Federal Reserve (Fed) will use taxpayer {dollars} to bail out cryptocurrency billionaires and different extremely compensated cryptocurrency buyers.
Within the letter, the Senator highlights that Treasury and the Fed have authorities that allow them to present monetary help to banks and non-bank entities in periods of economic misery. Treasury, for instance, manages the Trade Stabilization Fund (ESF), which was used within the 2008 monetary disaster to bail out cash market mutual funds. The Fed has used its 13(3) emergency lending services to present monetary help to a variety of economic and nonfinancial establishments throughout crises, together with the 2008 monetary disaster, the 2020 Covid pandemic, and 2023 banking turmoil. The Senator underscored that Treasury and the Fed “should chorus from propping up Bitcoin and transferring wealth from taxpayers to crypto billionaires via direct purchases, ensures, or liquidity services.”
“Not solely would it will be deeply unpopular to switch wealth from American taxpayers to cryptocurrency billionaires, it might additionally immediately enrich President Trump and his household’s cryptocurrency firm, World Liberty Monetary (WLFI). The continued crypto asset crash underscores why Congress should bolster shopper protections for the cryptocurrency business so crypto billionaires and different insiders can not profit on the expense of small merchants and retirees” wrote the Senator.
“In latest weeks, Bitcoin, which constitutes practically 60% of the complete crypto ecosystem by market capitalization, has misplaced greater than $2 trillion, or about 50%, in worth since its October 2025 peak,” wrote the Senator. “It’s deeply unclear what, if any, plans the U.S. authorities at the moment has to intervene within the present Bitcoin selloff. Finally, any authorities intervention to stabilize Bitcoin would disproportionately profit crypto billionaires.”
The Senator continued: “Federal monetary businesses should strengthen protections for retail crypto buyers. Final yr, a file $17 billion was misplaced or stolen to cryptocurrency scams and fraud, pushed by a large 1400% year-over-year enhance in impersonation scams.”
The Senator confused that any authorities response to the latest crypto crash should be centered round strengthening safeguards for particular person crypto buyers, not on issuing an American taxpayer-funded bail out to crypto billionaires.
The Senator asks for written affirmation from Treasury and the Fed that they won’t use their authorities, together with however not restricted to the ESF and 13(3) liquidity services, to bail out the Bitcoin market or crypto asset intermediaries no later than February 27, 2026.
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