Outside Source
Jonathan Gould served in the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency in Donald Trump’s last administration and went on to a stint in the crypto industry at blockchain firm Bitfury.
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US President Donald Trump has nominated the former crypto firm executive Jonathan Gould to head the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) — the country’s bank regulator.
The White House on Feb. 11 submitted its nomination of Gould to the Senate. If confirmed, he’d be the Comptroller of the Currency for a term of five years.
Gould is the former chief legal officer of blockchain infrastructure firm Bitfury and is currently a partner at the law firm Jones Day. He previously served as the OCC’s senior deputy comptroller and chief counsel from late 2018 to mid-2021 in Trump’s first administration, and prior to that was a director at BlackRock from 2014 to 2018.
The OCC regulates and supervises all national US banks that are part of the Federal Reserve System, such as major banks JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, with the aim to ensure the safety of the US banking system.
Kristin Smith, CEO of crypto advocacy body the Blockchain Association, said in a statement on X that Gould “is an excellent choice for Comptroller of the Currency,” and his tenure in the crypto industry was ideal to “effectively lead the agency.”
Jonathan Gould (pictured) served in the OCC under Trump’s last administration. Source: Jones Day
Investment firm Electric Capital co-founder Avichal Garg said on X that Gould’s nomination was “a very positive development for fintech and crypto founders looking for better access to financial services.”
Garg added that Gould “wants fair banking access for crypto firms” and “opposes Operation Chokepoint 2.0” — a term the crypto industry coined to reference a claimed Biden administration initiative to cut it off from banks.
In a March 2023 testimony before a House Financial Services Digital Assets Subcommittee hearing on the Biden administration’s approach to crypto, Gould said that regulatory action at the time could be “having a chilling effect” on banks’ ability to engage in crypto activities, dampening their “willingness to entertain or maintain digital asset entities as banking customers.”
Gould’s nomination comes amid Trump administration officials recently examining whether it’s possible to fold the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation into the Treasury or combine the FDIC’s regulatory role with the OCC, The Wall Street Journal reported on Feb. 11, citing people familiar with the matter.
Trump’s nomination of Gould is his latest pick in a string of nominees with ties to the crypto industry tapped to head key financial regulators.
Brian Quintenz, the head of policy for the crypto arm of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), was nominated by Trump to chair the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
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The crypto industry widely expects Quintenz to — if confirmed — push a pro-crypto policy at the CFTC to establish the agency as the primary crypto regulator over the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Another recent nomination of note is Trump’s Feb. 11 nomination of John Hurley as the Treasury’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial crimes, a role in which he would oversee the department’s terrorist and crime-fighting arm.
Electric Capital’s Garg said on X that Hurley has made Bitcoin (BTC)-related investments, “so likely has [a] measured approach to crypto.”
Garg added Hurley was likely to focus on money laundering and crypto enforcement and said to “expect strict compliance demands, possible stablecoin oversight, and [a] crackdown on illicit flows — he is pro-innovation but guardrails will likely be firm.”
Magazine: Crypto has 4 years to grow so big ‘no one can shut it down’ — Kain Warwick, Infinex
This article first appeared at Cointelegraph.com News
