The farce that is America’s ‘crypto election’ - FT中文网
登录×
电子邮件/用户名
密码
记住我
请输入邮箱和密码进行绑定操作:
请输入手机号码,通过短信验证(目前仅支持中国大陆地区的手机号):
请您阅读我们的用户注册协议隐私权保护政策,点击下方按钮即视为您接受。
观点 区块链与数字货币

The farce that is America’s ‘crypto election’

This campaign may be awash with crypto money and rhetoric but it’s not clear that either of the candidates really care

November 5, by all accounts, is set to be America’s first “crypto election”. Hundreds of millions of real dollars have poured into pro-crypto political action committees. Kamala Harris has talked about encouraging “innovative technologies”. Donald Trump, her rival for the presidency, has decided that bitcoin isn’t “a scam” after all, embarked on a series of crypto ventures and promises to make America “the crypto capital of the planet”.

“The crypto voter is real, bipartisan and ready to engage this cycle,” the executive director of lobby group Stand With Crypto, founded and funded by America’s biggest crypto exchange Coinbase, enthused last week. (The group gives politicians grades for their crypto stance, and Trump — unusually — gets an A.)

But reader, I must level with you right off the BAT (a digital token): the crypto voter is not, in any substantive sense, real. Aside from the small group of men (OK, mainly men) whose livelihoods now depend on this digitally indigenous fluff, most Americans have rather bigger things to worry about — food prices, healthcare, the jobs market, or the general state of their nation, maybe.

The idea, therefore, that there is a “constituency” of crypto voters needing to be pandered to, whose top issue is making sure that exchanges and other companies aren’t too heavily regulated, is fanciful. And yet that is the narrative being pushed by the industry, along with some creatively interpreted statistics.

“Crypto is a national priority . . . 52mn Americans own crypto and want their voices to be heard in the upcoming elections,” claims Stand With Crypto (the 52mn is certainly contested). “Nearly nine in ten Americans believe the financial system is overdue for an update. Yet, US policymakers seem content on maintaining the status quo, rather than fulfilling their responsibilities.”

This, presumably, means making sure people like multibillionaire Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong can continue to get richer. Because if it’s really the crypto owners being considered here, they are doing just fine, thanks (or the ones lucky enough to choose an exchange that didn’t steal it all, anyway).

Despite the Biden-Harris administration being “very hostile” to crypto, according to Trump — “extremely hostile, like nobody can believe” — bitcoin has more than quadrupled in price since the 2020 election, reaching a record high earlier this year. The estimated value of the entire crypto market has almost sextupled. If it’s US jobs we’re talking about, industry figures show almost a third of the world’s crypto workforce is based in the US.

Crypto is also responsible for almost half of all corporate spending on the election so far, with the pro-crypto Fairshake super Pac having raised more than $200mn alone.

But while the fact that there is a huge amount of both crypto money and crypto rhetoric in this campaign is in no doubt, does either candidate really care? Let’s look at Harris’s own words. Until recently, there were none. But last Sunday at a Wall Street fundraiser, she finally said: “We will encourage innovative technologies like AI and digital assets, while protecting our consumers and investors.”

For all those getting excited about her sudden conversion — Stand With Crypto even graded her a B, for being “somewhat pro-crypto”, before downgrading after a backlash — let me make clear my own thoughts: Harris couldn’t give a flying Satoshi. She has promised nothing at all. Her comments were designed not to alienate the tech world by coming across as heavy-handed while keeping those who favour stronger regulation on side.

Trump has sold four collections of NFTs, and generously offers Americans the “chance to contribute to the campaign with cryptocurrency”. But if you think his interest goes beyond his own prospects, you too should brace for disappointment. He might be lauded by Coinbase’s chief policy officer for his “concrete and visionary positions” but he doesn’t seem to take the whole thing very seriously. “Have a good time with your bitcoin and your crypto, and everything else that you’re playing with,” he told July’s bitcoin 2024 conference.

Neither does Trump display much understanding — which, to be fair, he at least owns up to. At the launch of his and his sons’ latest foray into crypto, World Liberty Financial, he compared it to learning Chinese. What the company will do remains unclear.

Still, at least the venture’s “DeFi visionary” seems to get it. “Barron knows so much about this,” the former president said of his 18-year-old son. “He talks about his wallet. He’s got four wallets or something, but he knows this stuff.” Remember remember the fifth of November. Cluelessness, claptrap and grift.

jemima.kelly@ft.com

版权声明:本文版权归FT中文网所有,未经允许任何单位或个人不得转载,复制或以任何其他方式使用本文全部或部分,侵权必究。

再次陷入危机的大众汽车能走上改革之路吗?

欧洲最大的汽车制造商正与工人和政界人士交战,试图渡过痛苦的电动汽车转型期。

哈里斯的另一个大选对手:通货膨胀

美国选民对高昂生活成本的不满可能决定下周谁将赢得白宫。

Lex专栏:Meta和微软通过季度理智检查

科技巨头今天吹捧真正的胜利,以证明明天的巨额投资是合理的。投资者对此是支持的,但程度有限。

FT社评:英国工党预算——雄心勃勃,前景不明

财政大臣蕾切尔•里夫斯现在必须兑现她的投资计划,否则税收还将进一步增加。

Lex专栏:大众汽车很难走出死胡同

尽管这家汽车制造商计划裁员和关闭工厂,但投资者的担忧是可以理解的。

安谋如何成为人工智能投资热潮中的意外赢家

这家由软银控股的英国芯片设计公司的股价在过去一年上涨了两倍。但它的野心远不止于此。
设置字号×
最小
较小
默认
较大
最大
分享×