Pro-crypto CFTC boss, subcommittee rumored as Trump inauguration nears

The US Senate Banking Committee is reportedly set to create its first-ever crypto subcommittee, while a pro-crypto commissioner is now a top pick to replace the outgoing chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, according to two reports. 

The two reports — seen as positive developments for the crypto industry — come less than two weeks from President-Elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, set for Jan. 20. 

According to a report from FOX Business on Jan. 9, following a Punchbowl News report on Jan. 8, the US Senate Banking Committee’s new chair, Senator Tim Scott, has put the creation of the subcommittee as a top priority and is hoping to replicate the House Financial Services Committee’s model, which first made a crypto subcommittee in 2023.

Two Senate aides told FOX that Scott has put forward Senator Cynthia Lummis to chair the subcommittee pending a vote on her approval to happen in the next few days. Lummis, a longtime crypto supporter, has recently echoed Trump’s push for a strategic Bitcoin (BTC) reserve.

Trump has made sweeping promises to reign in crypto regulation and turn the US into a “crypto capital,” and the Senate Banking Committee is the key overseer of financial agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission and federal monetary policy.

A memo seen by FOX said Senators Bernie Moreno, Dave McCormick, Thom Tillis and Bill Hagerty were being considered for the new crypto subcommittee who are all “strongly supportive” of crypto, according to the digital assets lobby group Stand With Crypto.

It is not known which Democrats will make up the subcommittee, but Senator Elizabeth Warren, a vocal crypto skeptic, is the party’s most senior member in the Senate Banking Committee.

In 2024, the House passed a key crypto bill known as FIT21 that was created by the House Financial Services crypto subcommittee that would hand greater regulatory control to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. It is currently awaiting action in the Senate.

Mersinger tipped to lead CFTC

Meanwhile, Unchained reported on Jan. 9 that five people close to the matter said CFTC Commissioner Summer Mersinger has emerged as a leading pick to chair the agency as current CFTC chair Rostin Behnam said he’d be stepping down when Trump takes office.

Mersinger has overtaken ex-CFTC commissioner and a16z policy head Brian Quintenz for the job as she’s seen as someone who could actually pass a Senate confirmation as she was a staffer for Senate majority leader John Thune for 12 years.

As she’s already a Commissioner, Trump could also just simply appoint her to a temporary chair role to head the agency while the Senate deliberates on her confirmation.

Mersinger has made crypto-supportive comments, telling a Blockchain conference in November that she was “uncomfortable” that the CFTC was “kind of setting some sort of policy through our enforcement cases.”

Trump is set to take office on Jan. 20, officially giving Republicans full control of the government after the party picked up a majority of Senate seats and kept its House majority in November’s elections. The new Congress kicked off on Jan. 3.

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