Crypto executives see US crypto laws coming this year under Trump

Cryptocurrency bosses are optimistic about changes to sweeping federal regulations for the industry coming this year after pro-bitcoin Donald Trump returned to the White House.

General directors of the company CoinbaseBinance and Circle told CNBC that they now see a clearer path to enforce some specific regulations on digital assets — unlike the previous US administration, which took aggressive enforcement action against several major crypto companies.

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

“You have to remember, for the last four years, we really felt like we were being attacked by this administration,” Armstrong told CNBC in a televised interview at the World Economic Forum’s annual event in Davos, Switzerland.

“They tried to use the lack of clarity in the rules to really push away even good actors,” Armstrong added. “To be fair, there were some bad actors, but they even tried really hard to go after the good actors, I think, just like us.”

Coinbase is the largest crypto trading platform in the US. The firm often promotes itself as a regulated alternative to offshore exchanges such as Binance.

On Tuesday, the US Securities and Exchange Commission announced the launch of a “crypto task force” aims to “develop a comprehensive and clear regulatory framework for crypto-assets”.

According to the agency’s statement, the SEC group will be tasked with developing a clear set of rules for the crypto sector, as well as addressing issues related to coin registration.

Coinbase’s Armstrong said the top priority for crypto as an industry is to work on legislation in the US to bring clarity.

“The industry is just ready for these new changes,” 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 in terms of US crypto legislation.

Teng said he sees “much tighter regulation” in the U.S. this year — and that it will help bitcoin and other digital assets.

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

Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, broke the $100,000 mark for the first time last year as traders were optimistic about the crypto industry’s prospects under the Trump administration.

According to data from CoinGecko, the token was trading at around $104,000 on Wednesday.

Binance’s Teng also expects the U.S. to create a strategic bitcoin reserve, something Trump proposed doing during his campaign.

Jeremy Aller, CEO of Circle, said he thinks “central banks would be wise to keep some reserves in something like bitcoin,” adding that it could lead to a return to commodity-backed money.

“If we look back, when we separated from non-sovereign commodity money, we really saw incredible abuses around the world through fiat, and that continues,” Ahler said. “The vast majority of governments in the world are in significant debt.”

“A place like Argentina needs open-heart surgery, shock therapy, to get out of this vicious circle. And I respect that this is an important topic for the US government now,” he added.

Trump previously suggested that the U.S. national bitcoin reserve could be backed by crypto assets seized from criminal operations such as hackers and fraud groups.

Along with a pro-crypto president, the U.S. now also has senators and representatives who support the technology and want to introduce regulation — something that is “absolutely appropriate,” Ahler stressed.

Ahler noted that there are already “American champions” in the crypto space, such as Circle, Coinbase and blockchain platform Solana. “I think under the new administration we’re going to see very likely rapid progress in developing regulations and policies to develop this industry,” he said.

Circle’s CEO believes that US legislation is evolving, especially regarding so-called stablecoins — digital tokens designed to be pegged to real-world assets such as the dollar — given that such tokens already have bipartisan support in Congress. Circle behind USDCwhich is one of the largest stablecoins.

The The Stable Coin Payments Clarity Acta bill that seeks to establish a regulatory regime for licensing stablecoin issuers was making its way through Congress before last year’s election. It has not yet passed a vote in the House of Representatives.