Trump to Appoint Silicon Valley VC David Sacks as AI, Crypto Czar

Trump Plans to Appoint Musk Confidant David Sacks as AI, Crypto Czar

President-elect Donald Trump named a Silicon Valley investor close to Elon Musk as the White House’s artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency policy chief, signaling the growing influence of tech leaders and loyalists in the new administration.

David Sacks, a longtime venture capitalist who worked with Musk at PayPal more than two decades ago, will serve as the “White House A.I. & Crypto Czar,” Trump said on his social-media platform Truth Social.

“In this important role, David will guide policy for the Administration in Artificial Intelligence and Cryptocurrency, two areas critical to the future of American competitiveness,” he posted.

Trump’s SEC pick Atkins marks victory for establishment expertise

While Wall Street breathed a sigh of relief at President-elect Donald Trump’s pick of respected Washington lawyer Paul Atkins to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission, critics worry his light-touch philosophy and crypto-friendly stance will hurt investors.

After a string of controversial cabinet picks considered by critics to be lacking in qualifications, financial executives had wondered whether populist Trump loyalists were headed for the financial agencies too. But the choice of Atkins, a former top SEC official and well-liked veteran of financial and Republican circles, marked a victory for establishment expertise, said industry executives.

Several people who have worked with Atkins also described him as highly professional, principled and fun.

“Paul is a quality pick who will have credibility on both sides of the aisle,” said Stephen Crimmins, who worked as an enforcement attorney at the SEC for 14 years, overlapping with Atkins for some of that time. “He knows securities regulation cold and has the people skills to get things done.”

Binance Platform Coin Resales Are Securities Trades, SEC Says

New SEC allegations about investor-to-investor sales of Binance Holdings Ltd.’s BNB coin and ten other cryptocurrency assets are sufficient to support claims for operating an unregistered securities exchange, the agency said in a brief.

The claims against Binance and two affiliates—BAM Trading Services Inc. and BAM Management US Holdings Inc.—should be allowed to proceed, the Securities and Exchange Commission told the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Wednesday in opposition to the companies’ requests for dismissal. The BAM companies operate the Binance.US cryptocurrency exchange.

The Cryptocurrency You May Not Even Know You Own

… There’s a good chance that MicroStrategy, which trades like Bitcoin’s wilder cousin, is hiding in your retirement account.

I own the stock indirectly, as a holder of Vanguard index funds through my workplace retirement plan. And it is a holding in all manner of diversified stock funds that include small and midsize publicly traded companies, run by Vanguard, Fidelity, BlackRock, Morgan Stanley or, really, just about any large asset manager.

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The problem is that through companies like MicroStrategy, as well as Coinbase, crypto has already entered nearly every traditional portfolio.

I wouldn’t buy Bitcoin directly. But the MicroStrategy example tells us that Bitcoin is already creeping into the retirement savings of ordinary people. Pretending that it’s not there doesn’t help.

McKinsey unit settles claims it bribed South African officials

A subsidiary of top global consulting firm McKinsey & Company agreed to pay nearly $123 million to settle claims that it bribed government officials in South Africa, the U.S. Department of Justice said Thursday.

Federal prosecutors also unsealed a 2022 guilty plea by Vikas Sagar, a former senior partner at McKinsey who worked in the subsidiary’s South Africa office.

Sagar, 56, of Johannesburg, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, to one count of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

The subsidiary, McKinsey Africa, paid bribes to officials at two state-controlled utility companies in South Africa between 2012 and 2016 in order to secure lucrative consulting contracts, the DOJ said in a press release.