The crypto industry has spent millions this election. Here’s what it hopes to get in return.
Both major presidential candidates have tried to appeal to the crypto industry as the money pours in.
With the US presidential election just two weeks away, the world is about to find out just how influential the cryptocurrency industry really is.
Crypto companies, executives, and super PACs have spent huge sums this election cycle, outspending even perennial big spenders like the Koch family, according to Federal Election Commission filings.
The crypto industry has outspent every other industry, injecting almost $120 million into federal races as of August, according to OpenSecrets, a nonprofit that tracks campaign spending. Fairshake, the leading pro-crypto super PAC, raised over $204 million for the 2024 election cycle.
While Faireshake has donated in favor of candidates on both sides of the aisle, it only spent against Democrats. According to OpenSecrets, Fairshake spent over $13 million in total against three Democrats — Sen. Katie Porter, Rep. Jamaal Bowman, and Rep. Cori Bush — who each lost their primaries.
Perhaps nowhere has the industry’s spending been more acute than in Ohio, where the once-favored Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown is now in a tight race against Republican Bernie Moreno, a blockchain entrepreneur. Crypto supporters have zeroed in on the race, spending tens of millions to support Moreno.
Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris have both made overtures to the crypto community during their campaigns, but just how far the industry’s influence can stretch won’t be clear until after Election Day.
Industry leaders told B-17 that many in the crypto world hope a crypto-friendly Congress or president can influence how the government regulates digital currencies or, at the very least, encourage the Securities and Exchange Commission to provide clear rules on how it wants crypto companies to protect consumers.
JP Richardson, the CEO at Exodus Crypto Wallet, told B-17 that he donated the maximum contribution that he could — $844,000 — to Trump’s campaign.
Trump, who once called crypto a scam, has more recently fueled hope that he’d be good for crypto entrepreneurs. On the campaign trail, he has promised to make America “the crypto capital of the planet.”
The rhetoric is paying off for him. A pro-Trump political action committee has raised at least $7.5 million in crypto donations since June, and as Trump’s betting market odds climb ahead of the election, there’s been a corresponding surge in bitcoin’s value.
Trump visited the Bitcoin 2024 crypto conference in Nashville in July, where he pledged to fire SEC Commissioner Gary Gensler and keep all of the federal government’s bitcoin in a “strategic national bitcoin stockpile” if elected.
The audience gave Trump a standing ovation at the mention of firing Gensler, Richardson said, “because the industry wants that clear regulatory guidance from the SEC.”
“I personally have supported Trump, and I would have been happy to extend that same support to Harris if she had come out with a bold stance in supporting the industry in the same way that Trump did, but she has not done that,” Richardson said.
Harris has been less vocal about her position on crypto, but she has started to show quiet support for the industry on the campaign trail in recent months. In September, she addressed crypto at a Wall Street fundraiser, where she said her administration would “encourage innovative technologies like AI and digital assets while protecting our consumers and investors.”
Barry DiRaimondo, cofounder and CEO of real estate crypto fund SteelWave Digital, said he thinks a Trump victory is still the best outcome for crypto because he “is advocating for getting crypto regulated so it can become a mainstream financial product.”
“If you’re long in bitcoin and Trump wins, you’re going to be a happy camper,” DiRaimondo said.
Still, he said he didn’t donate to any political groups because “if we’re playing in the political landscape, we’re playing both sides of the fence.”
“Politically, as a company, we’re very neutral,” he said.
Richardson said Exodus also donated $1.3 million to Stand With Crypto, an advocacy organization that focuses on voter registration and informing people about political candidates who support crypto.
“We see the importance of getting pro-crypto candidates elected, and this, by the way, should be very bipartisan,” Richardson said. “So Stand With Crypto will educate people on these candidates.”
“We want to help with that education, and so the $1.3 million is targeted to helping in these swing states,” Richardson added.
For Richardson, the “turning point” in his decision to get involved in politics came on May 9 when his company planned to uplist on the New York Stock Exchange. Before the opening bell, the SEC postponed the listing to review the company’s registration statement, the company said.
“Before this moment, I didn’t really care about politics, and now I feel like I was forced and backed into a corner to really care about politics more than I ever have,” Richardson said.
