It’s an unstoppable financial vehicle that’s going to take over the world,” Mr. The billionaire Elon Musk, who hosted “Saturday Night Live” this weekend, was asked about Dogecoin, a cryptocurrency featuring the face of a Shiba Inu dog that was created as a joke but has recently surged in value. FTX, the cryptocurrency trading firm, is spending $135 million to secure the naming rights to the home arena of the Miami Heat. The lobbying burst is one of several recent signs nationwide that the industry is becoming a bigger presence in the economy. ![]() Some of the biggest spenders on lobbying include Ripple, Coinbase - the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States - and trade groups like the Blockchain Association. ![]() ![]() Lobbying disclosure records show that at least 65 contracts as of early 2021 addressed industry matters such as digital currency, cryptocurrency or blockchain, up from about 20 in 2019. Max Baucus, the Democratic former chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Jim Messina, a former top Obama adviser, also have recently been named to senior industry posts. Christopher Giancarlo, who was named to the board of BlockFi, a financial services company that tries to link cryptocurrencies with traditional wealth managers. The board of advisers at the digital chamber is stuffed with former federal regulators, including a former member of Congress and a recent chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, J. This is from an industry that was born only a dozen years ago, when the first cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, was introduced.Īs the stakes have grown, so has the recognition that the industry’s future - at least in the United States - will be shaped in Washington, prompting the rush to scoop up well-connected advocates. Globally, the value of all outstanding cryptocurrency has jumped to about $2.4 trillion - or more than the approximately $1.2 trillion of United States currency in circulation worldwide - from about $200 billion two years ago. Firms like Ripple, which is based in San Francisco, run cryptocurrency platforms that allow customers to make nearly instant global payments through a system that operates largely outside government monetary networks. So far, cryptocurrency has been a highly volatile investment, but it is already starting to alter the way individuals, companies and even some central banks do business. “If we don’t start planning and taking action soon, we have everything to risk.” “There is a tectonic shift underway,” Perianne Boring, the president of the Chamber of Digital Commerce, a cryptocurrency lobbying group, told other industry lobbyists, executives and two House lawmakers who serve as industry champions, during a virtual gathering last month. Ripple is just one of a long list of cryptocurrency companies scrambling for influence in Washington as the Biden administration begins setting policy that could shape the course of a potentially revolutionary industry that is rapidly moving into the mainstream and drawing intensifying attention from financial regulators, law enforcement officials and lawmakers. And to defend itself against the S.E.C., it hired Mary Jo White, a former chairwoman of the commission during the Obama administration. Trump to help it develop strategy in Washington. It has retained a consulting firm staffed with former aides to both Hillary Clinton and former President Donald J. Ripple has hired two lobbying firms in the past three months. ![]() The company, Ripple Labs, has enlisted lobbyists, lawyers and other well-connected advocates to make its case to the Securities and Exchange Commission and beyond in one of the first big legal battles over what limits and requirements the government should set for trading and using digital currency. When federal regulators late last year accused one of the world’s most popular cryptocurrency platforms of illegally selling $1.38 billion worth of digital money to investors, it was a pivotal moment in efforts to crack down on a fast-growing market - and in the still-nascent industry’s willingness to dive deeply into the Washington influence game.
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