¶ Intro
So what happened was there was this Genius Act, the stable Coin Bill regulation. Now there was this push from the banks and the Community Bank saying, our deposits are going to try up. Therefore, we have a prohibition on interstparing stable coins. So that deal was done for the
Genius Act. Fast forward to now the mark Structure Bill sits in the Senate, and the banks over the August recess said, you know what, you have to open up the Genius Act that we endorsed two months ago that passed already and ban affiliates so like reward programs on coinbase, as well as brokers and dealers from offering inters bearing stable coin products. They're a very well funded industry and
they have a lot of money to play with. So its a crypto industry and it's going to be a really, i mean candidly a fight of the juggernauts in DC for these next couple of weeks.
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I'm a big fan of this hardware wallet. So if you'd like to learn more, visit the link in the description. Hey, everybody, welcome into the Thinking Crypto podcast. I'm your host, Tony Edward and we're recording at Station three in New York's Financial District.
And my guests, who.
Needs no introduction, but I will have to introduce them, it's Ron Hammond, who is the head of policy and Advocacy at Winter Mute.
Great to have you first time in studio.
It's pretty crazy, and I've done so many of these and now it's awesome to see how far you've grown and how much this operation has become.
So congrats and it's great to be in the studio. Thank you.
Man.
I consider you a friend because we've spoken so many times on maybe over thirty interviews over the past four years. And yeah, like I said, really awesome to have this doing this in person.
With and no Georgia drama. So let's get into it.
Yeah, well you're no longer at the Blockchain Association.
¶ Working at Wintermute
Tell us about winter and your role there.
Yeah, definitely. So.
Warmute is a prop trading firm the base out of the UK. Actually, they were after the election looking to get back into the United States. I brought the CEO when I was at the Blockchain Association, as well as the COO and a few others from the Winter mut team over to the White House. We had a lot of great meetings and talk about how wear music was
I and come back to the United States. And it was after that White House meeting with Yevgeny that they reach out saying, hey, we're looking to build a team and we think it'd be great to have someone like you on board, and I was looking for a new challenge, and you know, they wanted to move up to New York and decided to take them up on the challenge.
And it's been really exciting.
So I'm only two and a half months in three months in so far, but it's been a lot of travel DC. I also cover the UK, which has got a lot of policy developments as well that I'm getting into. But for me, it's been really exciting because I really want to be on the front lines of the TRAT five versus Crypto fight, because we've all been talking about that's gonna be happening.
But now kind of on the front lines here.
So it's US and a lot of folks in crypto were over and soho and they got a we work obviously you're working down here in fi II. Yeah, cryptos creeping in on Wall Street. It's pretty exciting to see. And I'm excited for this role. So it's a lot of the same that was doing a blot chain association, but uh, now for one individual company. But you know, as a market maker, what's good for the marketmakers and
liquid providers is good for pretty much everyone. Ecosystem. So that's kind of the unique role we have, and I'm really excited to get more into it.
You know, Winter Made I've heard a lot about over the years, are you guys the largest market maker in the crypto industry?
You know, there's a different metrics I've been saying, so some folks say they we are. You know, I haven't seen, like, you know, the definitive stats on that stuff. But again it depends on the volume and stuff like that, but overall to say, we're probably one of the largest, if not the largest.
So it's really exciting.
That's you know, just coming from the UK and Singapore side, right and we just launch a whole New York office and we're building that team or working on the licenses and the regulation, which is obviously my role here, and so once that gets more in the place, the growth is gonna be exponential.
So we're really excited.
So it's kind of like a startup vibe right now in New York in our office of like five or six guys, and now we're really excited to be expanding as time goes on, and you know, it's only up from here.
That's exciting, man, And it's just you know, analogous of everything that's been going on with crypto. With a more favorable environment, people are coming back to the United States looking to expand they're no longer in fear like what it was over the past four years.
No, it's been crazy and it's weirdest think that New York is kind of like the epicenter of that. But we were just talking about, you know, I was spending time between Miami and DC last year, and in Miami the scene was huge, especially in the twenty twenty one, the twenty twenty four days. But I've seen a lot of excess now go into New York because folks realize the trad five fights here, the institutional money is coming in and this is the time to build, and this
is the time to grind. Seen that all across you know, the ecosystem, but especially in New York. It's been really crazy to see how much SOHO is full of fashion girlies and crypto bros. It's it's a very different, unique situation. But I'm here for it and I'm excited for like this next phase of crypto. This is gonna be a fun one.
Yeah, it feels like we're at the costboard to start
¶ Crypto IPOs
of a next economic boom powered by these new technologies like blockchain, crypto, AI and so forth. But blockchain crypto playing a big part of it. I mean, Ron, We've had how many companies go public and we're down by Wall Street just last week, Gemini a bigcoin, American bigcoin yesterday.
It's wild, it's crazy.
And I think we were on the ropes just a couple of years ago after FTX, but even before that with the ico, you know bus you could say in twenty eighteen, you know, there's been several times folks that put this industry out and we're here, we're rocking, and we're better than ever. And in some cases, you know, the trad fi folks are getting a little you know, nervous now. So again, this is the next phase of the fight cryptos used to fights, and I'm excited to see what happens next.
So, speaking of the trad fi fights, I think I
¶ Banks vs GENIUS Act
saw a Summer Mersinger's article this morning about banks are trying to push back on some of the Genius Act.
Yeah, so for folks who are unaware of what happened in DC. So what happened was there was this Genius Act, the stable coin bill regulation. Now, there was this push from the banks and the community bank saying, our deposits, especially in rule banks and community banks, are going to dry up. Therefore, we have a prohibition on interest bearing stable coins. And that was the agreement to more the crypto industry saying, hey, we believe this is going to
be you know, a thread to our deposits. We disagreed, but in order to get a bill forward, there had to be the banks and crypto to be you know, in some way aligned here. And so that was a deal struck in the Genius Act. Again, it wasn't the best for crypto, wasn't the best for the banks, but overall, that's legislation. Not everyone's happy. So that deal was done for the Genius Act. Fast forward to now the Mark Structure Bill. This is the last big crypto bill at
least on the docket right now. It sits in the Senate. Sure and the banks over the August recess said, you know what, our way to get us on board actually with the legislation is that you have to open up the Genius Act that we endorsed two months ago. That past already, you had to open that back up and ban a field, so like reward programs on coinbase, as well as a brokers and dealers from offering in just
bearing stable coin products. And that's the funny part is and ay, didn't you endorse that legislation would be also that bill's done, so it's kind of i mean, the upside with crypto policy, it's very transparent, so like to the everyday person, you're like, yeah, this seems like a pretty flawed strategy here, but at least right now, that's
where the banks are digging their heels in. And again, they're a very well funded industry and they have a lot of money to play with, and they have you know, in the past, been very effective in DC so but so as a crypto industry, and it's going to be a really, i mean candidly a fight of the juggernauts in DC for these next couple of weeks. So we'll
see what happens on that front. But overall, we're seeing now that the banks, which we expected for years, kind of now stick their head up on the water and say, yeah, you know, we're not either ready for it yet, or we should put on the brakes here, or maybe we need to, you know, build a motor bigger for our competition, so they don't really take our business away.
But hey, guess what, that's the market.
So you know, ron, sometimes I fire off on x bit tongue in cheek and I'll say, you know what this is because of the banks. You know, they're getting disrupted and their actions are speaking louder than their words. Almost here where you have the clarity people are not moving to on chain networks right using stable coins earning higher yield. Why do I keep my cash into checking and just move it over to coinbase or whatever it is.
It seems like they're trying to fight back, But in addition they're also building their own blockchains and their own stable coins.
And that's the typical kind of lobbying playbook in DC is if you're not ready for something or a product delay delay delay or throws many ropeblocks, you can until your internal systems are built up, or it may make some acquisitions and then you're ready to go again. I don't want to say broadly it's all the banks here, you know, who are universally opposed to in justsparing stable
coins or the crypto industry by no means. I mean I was dealing with a lot of banks when I was working on legislation back in twenty sixteen on like more cussy rules and stuff like that, like with Bny Mellon. So there's a lot of traditional banks and nutritial players that want this kind of legislation. Sure, there's just some folks who want that moat building or maybe aren't ready yet.
You know, we've seen more of the traceiations for the banks, like American bankers and bank policies to stick their heads up versus individual banks. But I'm sure as the fight gets a little more aggressive in the next couple months, maybe we'll see individual banks more being you know, taking them banter and saying, hey, you know, we oppose this provision. We think the mohould be bigger for banks. So we'll see what happens. But it's going to get pretty nuts pretty soon.
We'll see how that plays out. But you know, to your point, the crypto industry, we're ready to fight. We followed the past four years under Operation Choke point two point zero.
And much more.
Oh yeah, and again to say like there were a lot of banks, you know, we got de banked obviously during the Silicon Valley bank issue, a lot of folks, individual's incomanies got deplatform or debanked, but we did see a lot of banks, even some like JP Morgan who were posed publicly to banks actually ended up banking a lot of crypto industry that was debanked back in March of twenty twenty three. So it's kind of funny to see how this interplay of crypto and tratify and the
banks are happening. So we're allies in some cases, we're enemies in other cases, and that's just kind of the interesting weave we have with the DC. But again to the credit for everyone involved in the policy world. You can see a lot of this very publicly on Twitter and seeing kind of where the camps are and where
their opinions are and make a decision for yourself. And that's where I think, you know, crypto has the advantage because a I think we have the winning arguments, but b also we're winning a lot of votes here and it's like two thirds of Congress. Now, I mean, that's very rare for any issue to be two thirds of Congress on any issue, but we have two thirds of Congress supporting these bills stable Coins and Clarity Act.
You know, the momentum is on the one side, it's not for the banks.
So speaking of Congress and the Clarity Act, we heard
¶ Clarity Act current status
from White House cryptos are David Sachs, I think back in August that come late September the process will start.
What can you tell us about the Clarity Act and where we're at right now?
Sure things So just a cat chokes up everything. So again, Genius Act done, Stable Coin's done. Now that we have the Clarity Act, that's the big market structure bill that everyone's been talking about. Where's the SEC's line, where's the CFTC's line, what's the cutsy rules, and several other provisions that are really important just for you know, markets to operate here in the United States and create those clear rules that companies like wear a Mute very much need.
We need to have those clear rules if we're going to operate in the bounds of the law, and we need to have the bounds of the law out there. So this is the big bill passed the House with over two thirds of the House supporting it back in July. Huge margins again, huge, huge, huge margins. But the Senate they decided to take up their own version and we've seen a couple of drafts come out so far. There was a draft that came out about two weeks ago and it was from the Senate Bank Committee and then
the Senate Committee. That there's two committees involved, who does more of the CFTC stuff. They're still working on their draft, but what looks like we're having right now is that September thirtieth is what Senate Banking is telling folks publicly is that they want to have a markup or a vote in their committee. It's kind of step one or two of the ten step process, but they want to have that vote and get the process moving September thirtieth.
Now they still have to have a vote in the Act Committee, but at least for right now, the day to look at it is September thirtieth. Possibly it depends if we have a shutdown, but we'll be seeing more elizive warranty off against Tim Scott, Cynthia Lummis, Bill Haggerty, and several other pro cryptocienters on both sides of the aisle. And that's gonna be the first step to see how
much legs does this have. Again, it will be a different bill than the Clarity Act, So that means that the House will have to eventually vote on whatever comes out of the Senate. So and now we're seeing big established players like the banks kind of draw their hard lines. The crypto industry has drawn their hard lines where they want to support and not support. So it's going to get pretty nasty. And again, as we saw with the
Genius Act, which is kind of considered the easier abilities too. Sure, we saw the Credit Card Competition Act in, so we had credit cards and exchange interchange fees somehow get looped into this bill. We saw some dramas essential bank digital currencies come in and almost derail the entire bill itself. So you know, this is crypto and politics. There is no shorge of drama, and buckle up. I'm sure we're going to see a repeat of a lot of these uh instances and drama points very shortly.
I want to make sure I'm clear on something here in regards to that bill, because I know that Senate Democrats introduced a version. Were you saying that something else has to be voted in the House or once it passes the Senate, it's going to the president.
If it's different than what the House pass was the Clarity Act.
Then the House has to say, have to vote on it as well, so they have to vote in the exact same piece of legislation. So we kind of saw that with the Genius Act, where the House had the Stable Act, Senate had a Genius Act, and the Genius Act won out, and the House had kind of stomach it and vote on the Senate version rather than their own version. Again, so that's kind of what we're seeing
play out at least right now. But there could be a situation where there's so much drama and politics involved that the Senate says, screw it, we'll just do the Clarity Act and just like if we vote out here, it doesn't have to go back to the House. But the problem is that the Senate, you're going to need a lot of Democrats support yes. And that's where you reference the twelve Democrats here. You have to get sixty votes in the Senate out of one hundred people to
advance this bill. And as we saw the Genius Act, you know it's not guarantee you and get all the Republicans. We saw two drop off on that vote and then can't leay the Democrats are in a position of the negotiating power here. So they laid out their principles. One of them didn't include the provision on interspearing table coins. So I'm sure the banks are happy about that provision being included. By no means is that guarantee that's going to be
in the bill. But there was a laundry list of things that they want, and they understand that if to get the sixty votes, they're going to probably need at least ten, if not eleven, of.
Those twelve to come on board.
So this is where the jocking comes in politics, and a lot of that's happened behind closed doors.
So get ready to get exciting.
Do you think that Trump's families businesses involving crypto will
¶ Democrats & Trump's crypto businesses
be a roadblock? Because I know Elizabeth Warren is chomping on the bit to say, look, they're making a ton of money off of this.
Do you think that might be a problem.
Oh, one hundred percent.
I mean, we've already seen that play out in the House already where it was a dominating factor both in several market votes as well as just the debate on the House floor, but overall, actually compared to FIT twenty one, which is the market sucture built from two years ago the House vote on even with all the Trump drama and the Trump involvement in crypto, we've actually got more Democrats to support the bill this go around, So I think, you know, it's a lot of noise more than anything,
and it's kind of weird. Also, if you see DC media, you'll talk about how the really financial netted the Trump family like five billion dollars, But then if you look at more the market media and financial media, you'll see more how really financial taint and it's been to flop entirely. So I think there's also information flows that you know, different people are getting. But at the end of the day, at least I look at the House voats and I say,
I'm optimistic. That being said, though there was one, you know, several points actually the Democrats raise in their twelve or the twelve Democrats raise in their points on the competent interest for the Trump family. So I'm sure it will be a dominating factor in a lot of debate in the Senate.
So we'll see what happens.
Yeah, I'm kind of concerned about that part. Ron, So realistically, do you think this bill gets past late October? Or
¶ Clarity Act passing timeline
maybe it is November or till December before everybody goes on break.
You know, i'd Simnel Lumbus said at Salt Wyoming she's hoping to get done before December. And I think that's actually a pretty realistic timeline. Again, even though we're having hypothetically a vote September thirtieth on half of the bill, we still go way through other half of the bill to come out Senate. Our culture, that's going to probably be until late October, and then you have Thanksgiving, you a lot of the holidays, you have a lot of big bills to get done by the end of the year,
including government funding. We're facing a shutdown, and if they avert the shutdown at the end of this month, they likely will kick the can to Thanksgiving or Christmas, so we're gonna have another shutdown fight happening them too. So there's been a lot of drama Senate and time. The Senate is very viable, So it all that kind of depends on A how they moved through the committee for votes,
how by Parson, and then b what's next. But then again finally after it pass the Senate, it's got to go back to the House and you got to hope the House isn't adding thing because otherwise the sen has to vote on it again.
So this could get This could go.
Back and forth for a while, and it kind of depends on who's gonna stomach what and from which camps. And again all camps are involved here, so it's a lot of cooks in the kitchen.
So realistically we should all set our calendar dates to maybe December before Christmas around.
That's like more we're talking to more of my experience and be more we're listening.
But at the same time, I'm a lot more optimistic on marts structure than it was two months ago, even a month ago.
We'll see how these negotiations play out.
But overall, you know, we've seen a lot of the DeFi protections that the industry was asking for that got included in the latest draft. So at least right now we've seen a lot more showing up the crypto support.
Will those protections remain it remains to be seen over negotiations, But overall, it seems like, you know, compared to other bills in the past, including the Clarity Act, we seem to have a united in front of the crypto industry saying, hey, largely we're ninety five percent of this, which is it's pretty rare on in crypto these days and in curds of politics, but it remains me seen what the pop product is.
Absolutely Now, yesterday I saw Michael Saylor and a bunch
¶ Strategic Bitcoin Reserve
of bitcoin advocates were in DC trying to rally for the US Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Bill or getting that pass.
Any updates there you can share.
We haven't seen too much updates on that front. You know, we saw the White House report becoind of you know, a little mum on the law of those details there. Sure, you know, I think a lot of focus still is on the Clarity Act as well as marts structure and just getting that through. And we've seen the White House be more of a to bolster the congressional efforts rather than trying to do their own thing or do their own initiatives, which has actually been pretty exciting to see.
And then that's actually related to like more of the SEC and CFTC working together as well, So I think the White House would be more of a coordinator rather
than like a force driving everything right now. Sure, and but again that's that's really good because we have some really experienced folks at the agencies and Congress leading this stuff, but more in the Reserve itself, I think that there's a lot of still questions and a lot of folks wondering, you know, is this more of a Treasury play, a regulatory play, or is it a congressional play with like some centered lumbas is Bitcoin Act and so at least
it's good to see avocates, you know, pushing for that as well. But overall, I'd say for most of the industry, that bill is still pretty nascent in its days. I get to recall the Mark Structure bill. I mean I worked on a Marcus Structure bill back in eight years ago, and that you know version of bill obviously has changed so much over time and at two hundred pages plus, but that bill topic is still being debated to this day. So bills take a long time sometimes, sure, and that
is the frustrating part of Congress. It does take some while to build amentum, and that might be the hurdle right now for Bitcoin Act, but it mains to be seen. It's gotten good support so far in the House and Senate.
I've been on record saying that I think it's a hard sell for Congress.
Hey, we let's go buy bitcoin.
It's easy to say, let's take the bigcoin to be confiscated and start a reserve, but to go tell them because where are you gonna get the money? You Maybe Trump has been talking about tariffs. I don't know if it's him or someone else, but maybe some of the tariff revenue. But still I think it's a hard sell.
Yeah, it's you know, it's more of the optics I think is the hardest part and to overcome, especially for a lot of folks within the industry. And again there's a divergent opinions on like, you know, more of like monetary wise as it makes sense for policy. But at the same time, there've also been openness from center lummas as well as the administration saying, hey, look, we're open to finding budget neutral ways to make this work. Sure,
we're looking for tweaks to make this better. So the upside is it's very much of an opening dialogue and communication with the drafters as well as the folks and administration and saying we're open to changing our mind here of how this works, and you know, that's a good policy. It gets made Unfortunately, it takes time and for a lot of folks, I know that's frustrating, but that's the current situation.
Yeah, I feel like the market structure is the higher priority. Let's get that done. Then we'll work on bitcoin buying, bigcoin and things like that.
Exactly, We've got plenty of issues coming up.
I mean leaving got in tax issues and that's going to be coming up probably in January as well. So don't worry just because market structure gets done fingers crossed. There's plenty of other issues that the industry still got in DC.
¶ Crypto taxes
Yeah, the tax part is so big because people being able to spend their crypto would be great if they're not taxed at a certain threshold.
Yeah, the dominas is huge.
You know, marked to market is a huge one, Like kind exchange is a huge question mark sure. You know, mining staking rewards is another question. And actually Patrick witt over at the blockche Association last week, he was speaking to a whole group of you know, folks in the policy werealming saying that actually tax issues is something that's going to be next for them to look at. They're going to see what they can do without congressional approval.
And they're going to see what they also need Congress and move forward on. And Congress is going to be working on another tax bill, so I think crypto tax issues are going to heat up pretty quickly.
You know.
How much that will go forward remains to be seen, but the White House is exploring ways to do it without Congress, so we could see some clarity soon. Again, when it comes to timing unclear, but mark structure, to your point, is still the top priority. But don't worry, We've got plenty of stuff to come up next.
Yeah.
The good thing is we're making progress right exactly, not perfection progress, and that's important. Now you mentioned, you know,
¶ SEC CFTC
the SEC and the CFDC working together. We've been seeing some amazing activity coming out of the SEC and the CFDC. Credit to Acting Chair fam. What are your thoughts on how they've been collaborating and what's been the progress that's being made.
I mean, it's been pretty incredible so far as to say the least.
I mean, this has been two agencies that in the past have really never communicated and especially sometimes they've been you know, finding each other at leastly solid against her venom days. But right now it's been very much kumbaya open arms here. Of course, a lot that thanks to the White House for getting these folks in the same
room together. But at the same time, he's seen the SEC and CFTC say hey, look we're launching these you know, crypto sprints or Project Crypto, and they have been really evily engaging with the industry. Caroline fam even though she's the last commissioner standing at the current moment, she has been out and about, you know, making the rounds at least with the industry and hearing folks both abroad and domestically. So that's been really exciting to see on her end.
And they at least with the SEC. I mean, we had a long call with them yesterday. Actually I'm sure we'll have a conversation with them, you know, pretty soon again. But they have been very open, very transparent, very different in the past four years, and I'm very excited to see kind of what comes from the road show that they've been doing in publicly touting for the past couple of months, because it seems like questions around.
Token I securities, for example, there's a lot of question marks there.
There's a lot of question marks on custy still and it seems like the s see his points to do some rule making or maybe some exempt of relief or you know, something to that effect pretty soon. But at least we know something's coming down the pipeline according to all public statements from Commissioner Purse as well as Paul Ankins. So the transparency is great. It's really exciting to see these engagements and we'll see what comes from it. But
one thing is for sure. Folks in DC keeps saying I could not believe it's even busier now than it was four years ago, and doesn't see he's slowing down anytime soon.
It's exciting, man, and it's just a breath of fresh air. I am a big concern about the CFDC. There's so
¶ CFTC commissioner issue & Brian Quintenz
many departures. Like you said, Commissioner fam the last standing person there, and then Brian contends his confirmation is being held up, Like what's happening.
Yeah, there's a lot happening in the CFTC. You know, it's kind of crazy.
You know, at least in DC, what we're seeing right now is that you know, Trump is the center of power here and he controls everything from foreign powers as well as you know, who potentially going to bomb next to potentially who is the soybean regulator, and that is kind of unfortunately. The situation we're at is that a lot is dependent on the president himself or his team.
And even though Quintin's was up for nomination and wet to go in front the ad committee for his nomination vote got pulled at the last second, there's still a lot of questions why. You know, there's been rumors that the Winklevoss twins have been involved and saw the tweet that Quintin's did, and and Brian's a good friend of mine. I think he's great at the agency. I think he was great when he was there previously, so it'd be good to have him back. Yes, you know, Carolyn FAM's
doing as much she can. She's doing great job as well. But also there's four other commission slots that needed be filled, and we haven't really seen at least at this stage those names being floated. And again it'd be Republican names and Democrat names. He had the balance out the agency, right,
So there's a lot of questions and concerns. But the last thing I'll say, and this is kind of the new territory of the CFTC is we're seeing prediction markets and how much that's starting to take over in the CFTCRE.
So a lot of hype, there's a lot of noise.
There's a lot of scrutiny in the last administration on folks like Calci poling market that's changed. But also there are incumbents like the Indian Tries for example, Yes, who have seemingly been kind of behind the scenes of a
lot of the Quintin's nomination as well coined some reports. So, uh, you know, as crypto grows, I think they've kind of realized, hey, there's there's other factions and traditional legacy systems that will fight you in DC, you know, whether publicly or privately, and they are not going to go out without a fight. So so we'll see what happens. But again I'm always optimistic because we've been warning these fights.
And we've had a lot of them. So it's a it's just another one to add to the book.
Absolutely, And I'm a big fan of Brian as well. I've had him on the podcast a couple of times over the years. He's very smart, understands the technology in the market, and they need to get him in and we need to get these commissioners and it feels like the skeleton crews running CFDC right exactly.
Hey, the upside those the markets are operating. So he does show that even with the skinny you know or staff, the ages is doing pretty well. Obviously there's a lot of calls, specially in Martructure Bible to give them more resources. Yeah, so you know, again we'll see how that uh, you know, that operation works. But the fact that there's only one commissioner standing it is a little concerning. And also the chairs not moving forward at least right now concerning as well.
So fingers crossed. But yeah, that's definitely the top priorities for hopefully the demonstration.
Yeah, man, I hope they get their result soon.
Recently, well, actually you should say last week Tether announced
¶ Tether USAT Bo Hines
they're coming into the United States with a new regulated stable coin us AT, will be headed up by bo Hinz.
What are your thoughts on that move.
I mean, I think it's a great move.
You know, there's Tether has a lot of question marks, and you know, for years we were talking about this about how there was questions for the reserves did have
Chinese commercial paper or not. There was questions where they were even located at our headquarter at there was questions around the odds and ascess stations, and then finally there was a lot of question of are they going to be able to comply with the Genius Act, and it kind of seemed like, probably not, but this is now like their way to let's say, work around, but this
is a way to actually come into compliance. Sure, So that's been exciting to see it exciting to see how you know, the views on tether, especially in the industry, have really kind of done a one eighty where it was there's a lot more question marks, and then over time they've really shown, hey, like more more of the international stable coin, we're more this the on ramp of
the dollar. We buy a lot of US treasuries And that was actually the argument that one a lot of the older centers over was just that more of the treasury angle, and there were what other was doing on that front. So overall I had to give him a lot of props. On the lobbying front.
They did.
They got themselves out of a lot of situations and they're now at the White House up the Genius Acts signing, which is crazy because a year ago I don't think Tether the CEO would have sept foot anywhere United States because they could have been folks after him. So so it's been crazy to see that turnaround in that story.
And we'll see what happens in the marketplace because the stable point wars are they're definitely heating up, and especially here in New York, it's what all people are talking about.
Yeah, it's pretty wild.
I mean, you got the banks looking to launch their own versions and you got you know, I just had Charles cast garrillat Paxos and he's talking about the Global Dollar Network and that has so many participants that seems like a eight hundred pound gorilla that's coming. And I'm like, wow, this is how I'm curious how this is going to play out.
It's crazy.
And you know, the Genius Act is still like like now the invitation on the regulatory phases are starting, but we're seeing some companies come out and say like we are a genius complying stable colin. It's seeming weird, like how genius now is kind of like mainstream like in just the vernacular, especially in finance, but like everyone knows the Genius Act and it's kind of funny because like I used to be one of the staffers either write the acronyms for bill names, and I did the one
who did the Genius Act. And it's funny to think of like how that is now like in the vernacular everything in finance. It's just like it's just the Genius Act as it is. So it's great to see. We'll hopefully have clarity or some version of that next. I hope they come with a good name and we'll hopefully see that kind of boom at least with the you know, alts or other parts of the market if we get this clarity more than the SEC and CFTC from Congress.
Sure, jumping back to tether in this new stable coin, because you already have USDT in the market. I've used it to send funds to vendors overseas. So how do you think that dynamic plays out they start phasing out USDT in the United States, does the US government go after them in other jurisdictions or it doesn't matter because you have USAT here.
It seems like a very tricky situation.
Oh, I imagine, So I imagine these are the conversations that they're having right now. Internally, I do not know exactly how they're going to, you know, try to comply here. Again, we're still working on the occ fd I C REGs that come from the Genius Act, so there's gonna be still a couple more months and if not years to
get those rules in place. And that's probably where we're gonna see more us T not being utilized as much United States or maybe barred completely, whereas USAT or others are going to come in to fill that need or gap.
So so we'll see what happens.
But again, even though the Genius Act is signed a law, technically there's still more regulatory implications stuff that takes a couple months. So I'm sure the runway is still you know, pretty far out. But Tether's thinking far ahead here, it seems like, to make sure that there's no doubt whatsoever their their in compliance.
Sure.
Now you mentioned you know, Wintermute being in the UK or excuse me, in Europe and that you got the EU MICA regulations. Teler also had issues there. Tell us
¶ EU Crypto regulations
about the dynamic you're seeing there is a very similar to the United States.
It is actually so we're you know, in the UK especially, I would say it's probably the worst right now, and we're seeing a lot. No, there's some rumors going around because an FT article talking about how they're gonna limit individuals and corporations from holding stable coins call it yesterday. I don't think that's happening, at least we've seen no official word yet, but it's an FT article saying that this is coming down the pipeline. So I'll hold my
judgment until I see it. But if that is true, majorly concerning. And there's a lot of major other rules and regulations that the UK is starting to work on that are pretty concerning, especially you know, more on the privacy side of things, and so we'll see how these all play out. But overall, you know, my job is a little full in the US. There's a lot of stuff happening in the US, but the UK is incredibly important.
We're seeing a lot of issues there as well. So you know, in the EU, you know, Mika has it wasn't perfect by a means, but it was something, and of course they were the first movers and everyone's playing catch up here. So it remains to be seeing if
the other jurisdictions are going to jump ahead. But I'll see, if you're gonna jump ahead and be ahead of you know, the EU, you got to have some you know, pretty clear rules as well as you know rules of the industry can work with here, and that's gonna be really important the next couple weeks.
You know, I had a brain fart moment because I was thinking that UK was still part of the EU, but they obviously not. So I wonder if they're gonna do they have their own version of them Mika, or they're still to be determined on that.
They're still work on some consultation papers right now. So these did one for stable coins. It's consultation papers are kind of like the regulatory like rule making process, and so they're doing some for consumer protection, safeguarding, custody and save. Several others are in the works right now. So it's lengthy.
It's a little different than the United States. Still wrapping my head around it, but it's very, very active and we'll see kind of what happens with the firms are in the UK right now, because there is still a lot of concern of like, are we going to be still based in the UK after these.
Rules get in place, or we're going to be going elsewhere, it's not that hard.
We've seen in the US be a lot more open and to your point, you know, that's where we're been launching here. We've seen tether come back to the United States, so you know, excited see kind of what happens internationally and if that is a boon for the United States.
If these rules are more adverse, I.
Mean, I can't believe the UK is going that draconian, like you can't hold stable coins like what.
Yeah, so it's crazy and I think it was like twenty thousand dollars or something effect and don't quote me here.
Yeah.
Also I'm still waiting to see the official notice, but it is true. It's very concerning.
Yeah, because at the same time, it doesn't seem smart, because if you're thinking about currencies and what the United States is doing right now with the US dollar back stable coins, you want people to hold more of your currency, right, you.
Would think, you think, But you know, the UK operates a little differently here, and of course you know, still a lot of you know, questions you've worked out in United States. I think a lot of folks also look the United States as a leader here. So if the United States moves first in the mark structure stuff and sets a tone. Maybe they'll course correct the other countries. But I mean, of course there's a huge boon right now.
See like who can get the crypto companies to come you know, domicile on shore.
We saw al Savador be doing that for years.
United States is back in the mix, but there are others that are trying to lose that fight and scene so that they're trying to listen on purpose.
Oh my gosh, so wild.
What are your thoughts on these digital asset treasury companies?
¶ Digital Asset Treasuries
A lot of them are launching, not just in the United States but globally, buying tons of assets. It feels like it's bull it's great, but it feels a bit of a.
Bubble for me.
I mean, if you know, I have been crypto long enough, it's like when everything seems too good to be true, or that you know a lot of folks get in at the last second, then you you just naturally have those like you know, red flags that come up in your mind. So and I think it's you know, for a lot of the ogs a crypto and that's probably
worth experiencing. We've been through I c os, You've been through fts Uh, we've seen a lot of these, you know, kind of more red flags issues sometimes and overall, look, the it's excited to see the Treasury company is kind of more organized in d C. So you know, credit to the Digital Chamber for bringing a lot those folks
together in the other trades as well. But at the same time, you know, treasury companies have come up as concerns for especially Democrats during the March Structure Bill, and I think we're seeing a lot of the crypto skeptics just weighing for one of these major companies to go under or to you know, Deepak or what have what
have you, and they're just gonna jump on it. And that's where we're telling folks in DC it's like, hey, like you might not like all elements of a mark structure bill, but trust me, when a market failure happens or there is a course correction, that's a lot harder to play defense on, and candilely, the entire conversation changes. And FTXI we have been through that and it's did a huge damage. But three arrows, same thing, Tara, same thing, and there is a regulatory snapback always when there's a
market failure. So so we'll see what happens on that front. But overall, you know, we're monitoring it costly optimistic and hopefully nothing happens. But you know, the farway down we go down those you know, the top ten tokens and we get kind of more than ten, twenty thirty, forty range. There's a lot of concerned but DC has taken notice, So we'll see what happens.
Yeah, and my hope is that there's some balance because you have black Rock and these companies that are here, but there's a lot of holding in the ETOs and they you know, you don't have to worry about custody or that they don't have the funds or they're com mingling, you know. So hopefully that helps dampen some of the volatility in the bear market.
You would hope.
So so and again like these are you know, household trusted names here, so that is like there's some upside here.
But of course markets are sick with marker cycle.
And there are always some people who try to skirt the rules or skirt the code, and that's where everyone else pays for it.
We can we can't help our cells ron.
It's its own tail.
It's yeah, we did in the dot com boom, the real estate bubble even before that, right, Ginsir, I'm hearing
¶ Gary Gensler deleted text messages
this man deleted text before he ran out the SEC.
How is this happening?
Right?
I mean that was shocking.
I'm sure, I am sure the Oversight Committee in Congress is going to have a field day with this because this is Uh, there's a lot of questions here. There's a lot of questions of transparency at all with you know, that SEC. And during his tenure, we saw a lot of you know, se employees some you know, it doesn't matter what's the ali were on. There's a lot of grumblings with the employees of how Gunzel ran the SEC. Uh and we saw a huge excess of staff there
during his tenure as well. So, uh, this just adds to the laundry list. But yeah, in terms of transparency from regulator, it's really concerning. You know, there were rumors going DC for quite some time that he was using a signal to communicate. I don't know that's true or not, but we saw signals kind of backfired in this administration sometimes. So regardless, it's it's not a good one to see. It's very concerning to say the lady. Some clad folks
like Coinbase are jumping on it. Yeah, but I'm sure Congress is going to have some questions here because that is very concerning. The transparency should be there for a financial regulator, and we're just not getting it. And in fact, it seems like we're getting the opposite. We're you're seeing some cover up here potentially.
And Ron, I mean, look, I know we're speculating a bit, but the timing right, the time period of Windows texts were deleted, but with the FTX crash leading into Operation Choke point two point zero, it automatically leads to some collusion with Elizabeth Warren and much more.
Right, mm hmm.
There's a lot of questions, and again you don't know who who these texts were with, and maybe there's nothing there, but overall, we saw the actions that were coming out, and there's definitely how to be conversations that are happening behind the scenes. Unfortunately, it seems like we're not gonna know whe those conversations were, and that's typically not how you run a financial regulatory body. But I am sure Congress will have plenty of questions and oversight questions on that front.
He hard question for you.
Would any do you think anything happens against her from an accountabil standpoint?
You know, typically these are just a they're more of a dog and pony show. This is a way to bring in the opposite side and grill them and say hey, you know, of course the easy time around the election, and saying like do you want to bring this back again?
So that's how the usual politics will work here.
But overall, you know, there's the market reactions too, and we're seeing, you know, several companies saying I will not hire folks who worked uneath Gensler or a Gainser himself, or any firm that hires you know, his subordinates. And again, you know there's different views of you know, if that's should be okay or not. But that's how the market's been reacting, and that's how some folks they felt very slighted,
and rightfully so. But the SEC's actions, especially Gensler's, and it's our progatives made that decision, but there are adverse effects for him, probably outside of politics.
Try not to get too frustrated or depressed about these things, Ryan, because it's very frustrating.
To say the least.
Yeah, but you know that's the upside of this new administration. It's been the most transparent sense and it has been again just night and day, and it's been so helpful just to have that versus not having that right and we're still waiting for some of the rules and regulations, but at least you know where the dialogue is there and they are very eager to engage and props to the cryptotask for is the Paul Alkinson's team, Like it's so different than it used to be.
Absolutely, I think you said it right night and day. I mean, we see who the SEC is meeting with, what they're discussing, and it's like that should be how it was forever or you know what I mean.
Exactly, and it's kind of tice me, Like, you know, take the tokenization. Like example, we're seeing the SEC is posting every single meaning they're doing. They're posting every single comment letter doing where Meat had a comment letter submitted actually two weeks ago. So we've had a conversation like I mentioned earlier with the SEC and continuing going forward.
But you know, we're seeing folks like Sidell. You know, they're being public about their opinion, but they're saying, hey, we don't want token ice equities, but like, at least as that there's that transparency nature where were seeing now, hey Robin head coinbase where meet several others are in the opposite camps and so see what nasak.
So so that.
Kind of transparency is good because we want that dialogue to happen in the public rather than behind closed doors. And then or closed doors and those texts happened to get the lead in you know, years down the road.
So absolutely, man, this guy against there really really gets me upset. But anyway, I digress ron. A big update
¶ SEC Ripple case
that I think seems they would have impact on future guidance from the SEC was the wrapping up of the SEC Varsus ripple case, because this was this over this dark cloud hanging over like how are they going to treat this? What are your thoughts on that wrapping up? And how do you think that influences the Clarity Act and much more.
One hundred percent.
I mean a lot of the times the SEC was looking, you know, we saw a lot of these cases get either get dropped or they get more of a mistake
position from the SEC propective. I know there's other cases like this roman Storm case that you know, other industry pursuing, at least for the SEC, we've seen a lot of those cases dropped early and they were saying, hey, for us do rulemaking, for us to give guidance the industry, we need to have you clear the deck, and we need to also just show here are some of our official positions without conflicting some of the current core cases
that are happening right now. Again, you don't want one judge decided one thing, and that completely is countered to what the SEC goals are on this new administration. So they cleaned the deck, seems like, and that helped out a lot for more of like the things like like we're taking guidance. That's huge, Things like mean coins not being securious, that's huge.
So these are the.
Kind of things that they needed to do in the early process to now seeing the results on the regulatory side. So overall, like the Ripple one was the kind of the last big one out there, and it seems like and that's really good to see that kind of wrapped up. And that's been a huge socker for years on this front.
And you know now we're kind of seeing i mean a ripples extra piece, still kicking and doing brave dang well, even after the all the ups and downs has been through and we're now hopefully getting some more clarity from Congress and the regulator. So it's all smooth sailing hopefully. I'm sure there'll be some shoppy waters.
Yeah.
Overall it's a looking a lot more optimistic than it was before.
Yeah, I know a lot of folks are waiting for the additional all coin et apps to be approved, and a deadline's coming up in October. I'm going to talk to hester person next week, so let's see what we can get information we can get. Hopefully they approve the additional allcoin ETOs.
It seems so, I mean, at least, you know, everything's been going in positive We've seen some corrections from the etf issuers, so fingers crossed, but overall it's you know, it's looking a lot more that it was two years.
Scott's for sure.
Yeah, I'm excited. I'm excited and hopefully they get this Clarity Act through. Man. All right, Ron, I'm gonna wrap it up with a fun question here. If you weren't working in the crypto industry, what do you think you might.
Be doing Oh dangn that's tough. You know, I used to do campaigns back in the day. It does suck your soul. It's a really hard job. And so it was like, you know, we're gonna in politics and crypto. You know, honestly, I.
Think I would be probably back in the garment maybe a little bit. You know, I do miss my Hill days.
I didn't love covering crypto, healthcare, tax and trade and energy policy all in one roof. But overall it's a really cool experience. It's like, you know, everyone's kind of young and really energetic, and it's you know, it's politics, just have Crypto changes every day. It changes by the hour over there too, So I definitely miss Capitol Hill. But but overall, I love my job. I love everything I'm done, and especially we've seeing how far this industry has grown, and like how.
How we are sitting here today.
It's pretty exciting and I'm looking forward to seeing kind of what happens next, and I'm sure we'll be talking about it for years to come.
Bron, They got to make sure to put your name to at your name into crypto history books because you are working on the first version of a market Structure Bill with Warren Davidson back in the day.
It's a group effors log folks, and actually kind of plenty of those folks I've worked with, like on the staff side, because that back then all the members of Congress slaw was two complicates. They kicked it over to the twenty five year old staffer. Those twenty five year od staffers are now either at the SEC or they're in the industry now, or they're in the Senate, and it's like kind of cool to see how far we've
come and now that the members care about. So I'm excited for it, but hopefully is a movie one day. I think I got plenty of war stories, Damer the libra on this stuff, and I'm sure I got plenty of content to make it fun.
Directors and pr people out there.
This is demand to get or you got to write a book.
Ron I don't know if you're sure everyone's shoot my book. We'll see. I got plenty of stuff for y'all. I'll help promote that book for you. Heh, there we go.
Thank you so much, Ron.
Hey, thanks to Dolly. Appreciate it.