2024 is the year of elections, with more than 60 countries having their national elections.
From India, the European Union, Indonesia, Russia, Mexico, Iran, South Africa, and the UK to South Korea, Ghana, Taiwan, Romania, Rwanda, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Mauritius, Maldives, and Palau, the majority of the world will see a significant shift in their government this year.
However, when it comes to crypto, it's the United States that has captured all the interest and attention. The country has the highest number of crypto owners and is also at the top in terms of raw cryptocurrency transaction volume.
Against this backdrop, the crypto regulatory space in the United States is of utmost importance. However, the current government has been taking a hostile approach to crypto, with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) taking enforcement actions against several crypto companies and their developers.
The current regime is extremely harsh on crypto. Under President Joe Biden, the SEC has gone after privacy-centric Bitcoin wallet Samourai, crypto mixer Tornado Cash, Web3 Wallet MetaMask, non-profit organization Ethereum Foundation, DEX Uniswap, retail brokerage Robinhood, and Rippl, along with major crypto exchanges including Binance, Coinbase, Kraken, and KuCoin.
Most recently, the White House announced its firm stance against the H.J. Res. 109, which would allow highly regulated financial firms to custody crypto for their clients. The resolution would achieve this by putting an end to the SEC's controversial accounting policy on cryptocurrency custody.
Biden has vowed to veto the resolution if it hits his desk because the rule was created due to crypto's "technological, legal, and regulatory risks" causing substantial losses to consumers and for disrupting security regulator's efforts in safeguarding the broader financial system.
While the Biden administration continues to ramp up its efforts to curb crypto activity and innovation in the United States, Donald Trump has changed his tune on digital assets in an attempt to capture the crypto crowd.
The former president pledged to accept donations in crypto while attacking the current administration's crypto policies. Commenting on Democrats and the SEC Chairman Gary Gensler being "very much against" crypto, Trump said Biden has no idea about cryptocurrencies.
Meanwhile, he himself is "fine" with crypto, saying, "I want to make sure it's good and solid and everything else, but I'm good with it ... if you're in favor of crypto, you'd better vote for Trump." Trump told his supporters that he would even ensure that the crypto sector doesn't move out of the US.
This is a big change from Trump's earlier comments when he called Bitcoin a "scam against the dollar" and urged regulators to take action against it. In July 2021, Trump said in an interview that he doesn't like Bitcoin because it's yet "another currency competing against the dollar," which he wants to be the "currency of the world." At the time, he called for greater crypto monitoring.
This came two years after he posted on his now-deleted X (previously Twitter) account that he's "not a fan" and that unregulated crypto facilitates illegal activities.
Towards the end of the 2021 bull market, Trump reiterated his warning calling crypto "very dangerous," and warned that it could lead to a level of "explosion" never seen before. While Trump was criticizing digital assets, he praised his wife Melania Trump's plans for NFT. Trump, himself, has launched the NFT project; Trump Digital Trading Cards. This week, the former President said he would be hosting buyers who spent about $100,000 on his mugshot NFT at his private Mar-a-Lago resort.
Trump's u-turn on crypto is of importance as DCG's online survey revealed that over 20% of voters consider crypto a key issue in the upcoming U.S. elections while 40% want political candidates to discuss more about it. Interestingly, 48% of voters do not trust political candidates who interfere with crypto while 30% would be more likely to support a crypto-friendly political candidate.
"This year, the US election is all about crypto," said Ape Terminal Founder Hatu Sheikh. "So, on the one hand, we have President Joe Biden who's getting ready for his re-election campaign and wants to keep on working on his agenda that includes billionaire minimum tax and continued assistance to Ukraine. On the other hand, we have former President Donald Trump who has promised to support a 'record investment' in police and support crypto."
For the crypto industry participants, the choice is very clear: a candidate favoring the sector with a friendly regulatory approach and finally bringing a change to the currently hostile environment, said Sheikh.
This shows Trump's pro-crypto stance can earn him votes from the crypto community. However, that doesn't solve the problems for the crypto sector until there is a real change in the regulatory environment too.
