What To Know Ahead Of Dec. 8 House Hearing On Future Of Crypto Featuring Industry Leaders

Top executives from six of the largest companies in the crypto space will testify before the House Financial Services Committee at an upcoming hearing.

What Happened: In an announcement last week, congresswomen Maxine Waters (D-CA) called on the CEOs of six major crypto companies to speak at a hybrid hearing titled “Digital Assets and the Future of Finance: Understanding the Challenges and Benefits of Financial Innovation in the United States.”

The hybrid hearing will be held on Wednesday, December 8 at 10:00 AM ET. 

The executives speaking at the hearing include:

• Jeremy Allaire, co-founder, chairman, and CEO of USDC USDC/USD issuer Circle.
• Samuel Bankman-Fried, the 29-year-old billionaire founder and CEO of crypto exchange FTX.
• Brian P. Brooks, former Acting Comptroller of the Currency who now serves as CEO of crypto mining company Bitfury Group. Brooks also served as the CEO of Binance.US for a brief period of four months.
• Chad Cascarilla, CEO of blockchain infrastructure company Paxos Trust Company. Several institutions, including Interactive Brokers Group Inc IBKR, which offer users cryptocurrency trading through Paxos solutions.
• Denelle Dixon, CEO and Executive Director at the Stellar Development Foundation. Stellar is behind the blockchain Stellar XLM/USD.
• Alesia Jeanne Haas, CEO of crypto exchange Coinbase Inc. and CFO of Coinbase Global Inc. COIN.

Why It Matters: The agenda of the hearing is expected to focus on ensuring the “accountability of large financial institutions and emerging tech products and services.”

Chairwoman Waters is known to be a critic of the crypto industry and its largely unregulated nature.

In 2019, she convened a hearing in regards to Facebook’s - now Meta Platforms Inc FB - proposed cryptocurrency Libra.

Despite the rebranding to Diem and a host of other changes, Meta has been unsuccessful in launching its cryptocurrency despite several years of discussions with regulators.

Related Link: IS REGULATION BAD FOR CRYPTO?

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