Trump nominates pro-crypto CEO to lead commerce department

There were previous reports that Lutnick — a leader of Trump’s transition team — was in the running for treasury secretary

article-image

Kiran Paramesh/Shutterstock modified by Blockworks

share


This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe.


President-elect Donald Trump has nominated a crypto supporter to lead the Department of Commerce. 

The Wall Street Journal (along with Punchbowl News founder Jake Sherman) reported Trump’s expected pick of Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick for that job on Tuesday morning. Trump later confirmed the selection on Truth Social.

There were previous reports that Lutnick — a leader of Trump’s transition team — was in the running for treasury secretary. 

We highlighted Lutnick’s remarks on bitcoin in a September edition of this newsletter. At the time, the CEO noted that TradFi players — including banks and brokerages — would “go headfirst into bitcoin” when the regulatory environment improved. 

Donald Trump’s election win has seemed to set the stage for that, given the crypto promises he has made (namely, “firing” SEC Chair Gary Gensler).

Bitcoin surged to above $93,900 for the first time just before 2 pm ET Tuesday — up 3.7% from 24 hours prior.   

As BTC “gets invited into this party, up we go,” Lutnick added in a September video posted to X. That comes when banks can more freely clear, custody and transact in bitcoin, Lutnick said — a reality hindered by the SEC’s Staff Accounting Bulletin (SAB) 121, for example.

Aside from being vocally enthusiastic about the crypto segment, Lutnick’s firm has stablecoin issuer Tether as a client — a company that has denied being under federal investigation.

We and others are curious about what roles Lutnick might drop if he indeed takes on this cabinet position, so as not to serve his own business interests.


Start your day with top crypto insights from David Canellis and Katherine Ross. Subscribe to the Empire newsletter.

Explore the growing intersection between crypto, macroeconomics, policy and finance with Ben Strack, Casey Wagner and Felix Jauvin. Subscribe to the Forward Guidance newsletter.

Get alpha directly in your inbox with the 0xResearch newsletter — market highlights, charts, degen trade ideas, governance updates, and more.

The Lightspeed newsletter is all things Solana, in your inbox, every day. Subscribe to daily Solana news from Jack Kubinec and Jeff Albus.

Tags

Upcoming Events

Javits Center North | 445 11th Ave

Tues - Thurs, March 18 - 20, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

Brooklyn, NY

TUES - THURS, JUNE 24 - 26, 2025

Permissionless IV serves as the definitive gathering for crypto’s technical founders, developers, and builders to come together and create the future.If you’re ready to shape the future of crypto, Permissionless IV is where it happens.

recent research

LTIPPanalysis.png

Research

This report is a retroactive analysis of Arbitrum's Long Term Incentives Pilot Program (LTIPP). We collect relevant data at a protocol level and review bi-weekly updates to analyze recipients, their strategies, and the impact of the incentives on high level growth metrics. In particular, we want to highlight outperformers and underperformers, and glean any best practices or lessons learned for protocols distributing ARB incentives in the future. The overarching goal is to synthesize lessons learned that the DAO can reference as it begins thinking about future incentives programs–namely, the working group for incentives that is being actively discussed–especially as Timeboost introduces new conditions for trading and economic activity.

article-image

Sponsored

AI project Zerebro intersects the spheres of artificial intelligence, finance, art, music, and culture

article-image

Allmight is focused on furthering the United States’ leadership in crypto

article-image

The conditions Charles Schwab is waiting for before jumping headfirst into crypto could take shape soon

article-image

The FCA’s director of payments and digital assets shared some takeaways from chats with crypto companies and law firms

article-image

Let’s take a look at how US equities typically perform this time of year and what we might see in the coming days

article-image

Lumina introduces transparency and permissionless integration via an OP stack-based optimium, challenging traditional oracle designs