Crypto Executives See Us Passing Crypto Laws This Year Under Trump

Cryptocurrency company bosses are optimistic about comprehensive federal rule changes for the industry’s passage this year now that Donald Trump, who is a Bitcoin backer, has returned to the White House.

The CEOs of JammingBinance and Circle told CNBC that they now see a clearer path toward ensuring some concrete rules on digital assets – unlike the previous US administration, which took aggressive enforcement action against several major crypto companies. cryptography.

Coinbase’s Brian Armstrong said he sees crypto entering the “dawn of a new day” with a Trump-led US administration.

“You have to remember: Over the last four years, we really felt like we were under attack from this administration,” Armstrong told CNBC during a television interview at the World Economic Forum’s annual event in Davos, Switzerland.

“They tried to weaponize the lack of clarity in the rules to really push back, even on good actors,” Armstrong added. “There were some bad actors too, to be fair – but they even really tried to go after the good actors, I think, like us.”

Coinbase is the largest crypto trading platform in the United States, the firm often presents itself as a regulated alternative to offshore exchanges, like Binance.

On Tuesday, the US Securities and Exchange Commission announced the launch of a “crypto task force” aimed at “developing a comprehensive and clear regulatory framework for crypto assets.”

The SEC panel will be tasked with developing a clear set of rules for the crypto industry, while also addressing issues regarding coin registration, according to a statement from the agency.

Coinbase’s Armstrong said the main current priority for crypto as an industry is to work to get legislation passed in the United States to provide clarity.

“The industry is just ready for this new change,” he told CNBC. “They’re ready for clear rules. And that’s our big push.”

Richard Teng, CEO of Binance, highlighted token issuance, trading and asset management as some of the key things he expects to see progress on in terms of crypto-specific legislation

Teng said he sees “much clearer regulation” in the United States this year – and that would be favorable bitcoin and other digital assets.

“If you look at past cycles, this year will be a year that we see a new all-time high for the crypto industry,” Teng said in a fireside chat hosted by CNBC in Davos, Switzerland .

Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, passed the $100,000 milestone for the first time last year as traders grew optimistic about the crypto industry’s prospects under a Trump administration.

As of Wednesday, the token was trading at a price of around $104,000, according to Coingecko data.

Binance’s Teng also expects the United States to establish a strategic bitcoin reserve – something Trump suggested he would do during his campaign.

Jeremy Allaire, CEO of Circle, said he thought “it would be prudent for central banks to hold reserves in something like Bitcoin,” adding that it could cause a return to commodity-backed money .

“If we look back when we decoupled money from non-sovereign products, we really saw incredible abuses around the world through Fiat and it’s happening,” Allaire said. “The vast majority of governments around the world are significantly in debt.”

“It took a kind of open heart surgery, shock therapy, in a place like Argentina to get out of this vicious cycle. And I respect that this is an important topic for the American government now,” he said. he added.

Trump has previously suggested that a US national Bitcoin reserve could be backed by crypto assets seized from criminal operations, such as hackers and fraud rings.

In addition to a pro-Crypto president, the United States now also has senators and representatives who support the technology and want to put regulation in place – something that is “absolutely appropriate,” Allaire emphasized.

Allaire noted that there are already “American champions” in the crypto space such as Circle, Coinbase and blockchain platform Solana. “I think in this new administration we will most likely see rapid progress in creating rules and developing policies to move this industry forward,” he said.

Circle CEO sees the U.S. particularly advancing so-called stablecoins – digital tokens designed to be pegged to real assets like the dollar – given that there is already bipartisan support in Congress for such tokens . The circle is late USDCwhich is one of the largest stablecoins.

The Clarity for Payment Stablecoins Act, a bill that seeks to establish a regulatory regime for licensing stablecoin issuers, made its way through Congress before last year’s elections. It has yet to pass a vote in the House.