- Mike Selig is the main candidate to preside over the CFTC.
- The former corporate lawyer is a long -standing ally of the cryptographic industry.
- The White House officially removed the appointment of the former Trump choice earlier this week.
Mike Selig, chief lawyer of the working group on the Crypto of Securities and Exchange Commission, has become the main competitor to lead the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
A familiar source with discussions surrounding the process of appointment of the CFTC told DL News They expect the appointment of Selig “to occur at one minute.
And many in the industry queue behind him.
“Now, leading the working group on the dry crypto, he has delivered the most effective regulatory work that we have seen from any major regulator,” wrote Evan Weiss, chief operating at alluvial and former corporate lawyer, on X.
“If we want America to be the world capital of cryptography, Mike is the right choice to chair the CFTC.”
Similar applause came from several lawyers and cryptography lobbyists since Politico On Thursday, the news reported the news.
It remains to be seen if this support show can pre -empt the behind the scenes that recently gave up the appointment of the former Trump choice, Brian Quintenz.
Quintenz, the head of the policy of the cryptographic branch of the venture capital company Andreessen Horowitz, received similar praise from the crypto industry when he was appointed for the first time in February.
But his appointment would have been opposed by twins Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, co-founders of the Gemini Crypto Exchange and two of Trump’s most vocal supporters in industry.
In order to save his appointment, Quintenz has taken the remarkable measure to publicly share screenshots of text messages he said he received Winklevoss twins.
In these messages, they complained of a CFTC survey at the age of seven, targeting the Gemini which ended with a consent order of $ 5 million earlier this year.
Quintenz declared in the messages he would engage in a “fair and reasonable examination of the issue” as president of the CFTC. But he left all the “solutions” to an “fully confirmed chair”.
“Our complaint raises serious questions and concerns about the culture of the agency that you are about to chair,” wrote Tyler Winklevoss in response, according to screenshots.
“The cultural reform, which includes the rectification of what has happened to us, should be the highest priority. I would like to understand your reflections on this subject and how you plan to align yourself with President Trump and the administration’s mandate to end the reference and make it amends. ”
On X, Quintenz said that the texts “clearly indicate what they were looking for and what I refused to promise.”
“They completely naked it,” said the source. “They made a phone call. They said to themselves, “It will not fly with us. And it was a very short trip from there (the appointment of Quintenz) killed. »»
While the SEC regulates securities such as shares and bonds, the CFTC is responsible for regulating the term contracts on products such as oil and wheat.
A bill on the structure of the market which crosses the congress would have largely maintained the regulation of the cryptographic industry at the CFTC.
But the agency has been short -term for months. Although he generally understands a chair and four commissioners, he has been directed alone on an interim base by Crypto Ally Caroline Pham since September 3.
Ally Crypto
Mike Selig, former partner of the Business Cabinet for Business Willkie Farr & Gallagher, was a vocal supporter of the cryptography industry.
Before the Trump elections last November, Selig often criticized the approach of the former president of the SEC, Gary Gensler, as “regulation by the application”.
“The election is in a week, BTC has just broken $ 71,000 and the President of the SEC, Gensler, will soon clean his office,” he wrote last October.
“It is time for the dry to institute a hard fork in its approach to regulate the crypto and to welcome manufacturers in America.”
In March, it was exploited as lawyer general of the crypto working group of 14 people from the SEC, a group responsible for creating tailor -made regulations for digital assets.
In addition, he is currently the principal advisor to the president of the SEC, Paul Atkins, according to his LinkedIn profile. In a historical discourse in July, Atkins described a deregulation campaign entitled “Project Crypto” intended to bring the equity markets.
In particular, Cameron Winklevoss congratulated the Crypto project as “one of the most revolutionary things that I have read for a very, a very, a very long time”, at an industry conference in New York last month.
Before his visit to Willkie Farr, Selig held posts in Perkins Coie and the office of the former president of the CFTC, Christopher Giancarlo, another longtime crypto booster.
A SEC spokesperson refused to comment or make Selig available for an interview, citing the closure of the federal government which is currently running the United States.
Aleks Gilbert is DL News“DEFI correspondent based in New York. You can reach it at Aleks@dlnews.com.
