Author: Douglas Gillison, Tom Bergin, Chris Prentice and Isla Binnie

Washington – it is expected that the administration of President Donald Trump’s initial time of the boom, but the Reuters review shows that very few members of the upcoming congress are invested in bitcoins or other digital currencies.

On Thursday, Trump signed the order to create a cryptocurrency working group to open the regulatory framework, and just a few days before taking office, he launched a up-to-date cryptographic token.

But while many Republicans in the Congress committed to support the Trump program, Review of the Reuters of the latest financial disclosures by 535 arriving members Congress of cryptocurrency from their latest reports. The spouse of another representative is the owner of Bitcoin, and the other spouse has an agreement that could bring her coins.

Everything was said that it was less than 3% of members of the House of Representatives and Senate with direct exposure to cryptocurrency.

Although Congress members are generally much richer than the audience as a whole, their reports suggest that they have cryptographic assets much less often. According to the last Pew Research study, almost one in five Americans reported at some point when he invested, traded or used cryptocurrency.

The amounts are also tiny. One senator – the Hedge Fund director, Dave McCormick (NYSE 🙂 – has up to $ 5 million investments in the Bitcoin Fund. In addition to it, the total cryptocurrency value of all other 12 legislators is from 1.1 million to $ 2.6 million – a fraction of their reported wealth. JD Vance vice president reported Crypto Holdings in the amount of $ 250 001 to USD 500,000. (Reuters turned on a former senator from Ohio, and now a vice president, because his position makes him the president of the Senate).

Small investments are unlike money poured into American policy by the cryptographic industry. In the summer of cryptographic companies, they have already spent over $ 100 million, i.e. almost half of all corporate donations for congress races, constituting almost one in two dollars of corporate contributions, according to Public Citizen, a group of consumer sparkle based on headquarters in Washington, DC

Tyler Gellasch, a former lawyer of the US and stock exchange Committee, who manages the Markets Association Association, an organization in Washington, which is in favor of forceful regulations regarding securities, said that low legislator resources may be reluctance to lack of security related to assets.

“They are probably more aware of the risk than the general public, especially the lack of a coherent and solid regulatory system,” said Gellasch, adding: “It is not bad that members do not have their own interest in pumping. The value of own digital resources. “

Critics of cryptocurrencies, including some commercial and central bankers, emphasize the problems with fraud and say that they are not supported by based assets generating cash or companies, buying them more like gambling than investing.

Reuters asked for a comment of 13 members of the incoming congress, whose disclosure was demonstrated by cryptocurrency resources. Only two responded.

“The involvement of legislators now-through significant personal investments-it conquers his commitment to ensuring cryptocurrencies, becomes a solid industry led by the US in the coming years,” said Cody Carbone, president of Digital Chamber, a leading group of lobbying the cryptocurrency industry with the past American Securities and Stock Exchange Commission, Paul Atkins. Atkins did not answer the request for comment.

Expected regulations

The Reuters review is the first of its kind to be published for the upcoming Congress. It covers transactions at the beginning of January, before Trump began his own cryptocurrency while escaping to the inauguration. Reuters examined thousands of pages from 1,500 documents about the disclosure of the Congress submitted to January 22, conducting many automated searches of 1300 these and manual reviews for 200 entries that were handwritten or not scanned as clear images.

The incoming congress, both chambers currently controlled by Republicans, are to move to create a legal framework for Crypto growth as part of more conventional finances. The cryptographic sector opened a wallet to support Trump and numerous congress campaigns. Trump used supporters of cryptographic roles at high levels in his administration and recognized cryptographic investor David Sacks to be the artificial intelligence of the White House and Krypto-Car.

“It seems practically certain that Congress will take cryptocurrency reform in the coming year,” said Yesha Yadav, an associate dean at Vanderbilt University Law School and an expert in the field of digital assets regulation and market structure.

Yadav said that the low investment rate by Congress members is not a surprise. Crypto is still a relatively up-to-date advantage and “has not used a well-adapted, protective circuit in the US historically (a fact that should be well known to people serving in Congress),” she said by e-mail.

In Ohio, the interests of cryptocurrencies spent at least $ 40 million in previous elections, increasing the Crypthon Republican Berni Moreno, who defeated the cryptocurical-skeptical Democrat Sherrod Brown, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, in accordance with campaign financing acts. While the previous candidate for deposit on Moreno showed the dismissed trust from $ 100,000 to USD 250,000 in Bitcoins in 2021, according to his last application, which the senator apparently accumulated, without showing cryptocurrencies at all. The Moreno office did not answer the request for comment.

At least 10 legislators reported interest in Bitcoins, the most eminent cryptocurrency. Others maintained more vague investments, such as Rep. Mike Collins, a republican from Georgia, who owns three tiny cryptokuins, including “aerodrom” and “ski mask dog”. Collins’ total farms in Crypto are worth at least 56,015 USD and perhaps over USD 315 002. Because his reports were recorded, not a balance, it was not possible to establish a clearer range. Collins did not answer the requests for comment.

The disclosure in some cases listed assets that were not possible to analyze. For example, Cynthia Lummis, a Republican from Wyoming, was one of the best supporters of the cryptocurrency in the Senate, sponsoring bills to create regulatory framework for cryptography – and one last year that would require the US government to submit bitcoins. Lummis said in a recent CNBC interview that she had previously owned five Bitcoins, but she didn’t know if it was so. Her latest application does not show any. The entry in its disclosure in 2022 for the blind trust showed the participation of Bitcoins from 50 001 to $ 100,000. If she has maintained this investment, it should be worth $ 300,000 to USD 600,000 on Wednesday, assuming that it has changed into a bitcoin price.

Lummis was “an early investor before placing her assets in a blind trust … to prevent the possibility of any conflict of interests,” the spokesman said in a statement.