Brian Armstrong
@brian_armstrong
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Co-founder & CEO at @Coinbase . Creating more economic freedom in the world. ENS: barmstrong.eth Co-founder @researchhub @newlimit
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Twitter has broken just about every piece of this FTX story using blockchain analytics, while NYT is writing puff pieces on a criminal.
Feels like a turning point for citizen journalism and loss of trust in MSM.
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Regarding the SEC complaint against us today, we're proud to represent the industry in court to finally get some clarity around crypto rules.
Remember:
1. The SEC reviewed our business and allowed us to become a public company in 2021.
2. There is no path to "come in and
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I got married this past weekend to my long term partner and best friend, Angela Meng! Can’t wait to build a life together.
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1/ Some really sketchy behavior coming out of the SEC recently.
Story time…
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We recently received board approval to purchase over $500M of crypto on our balance sheet to add to our existing holdings. And we'll be investing 10% of all profit going forward in crypto. I expect this percentage to keep growing over time as the cryptoeconomy matures.
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I don't care how messy your accounting is (or how rich you are) - you're definitely going to notice if you find an extra $8B to spend.
Even the most gullible person should not believe Sam's claim that this was an accounting error.
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@SenWarren
@SECGov
was an offshore exchange not regulated by the SEC.
The problem is that the SEC failed to create regulatory clarity here in the US, so many American investors (and 95% of trading activity) went offshore.
Punishing US companies for this makes no sense.
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1/ There are a few key moments that define our future. One is happening now in the Senate w/ the infrastructure bill. At the 11th hour
@MarkWarner
has proposed an amendment that would decide which foundational technologies are OK and which are not in crypto. This is disastrous.
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9 years ago today, I founded Coinbase. One of the most important lessons I come back after all this time is long-term focus.
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Elon buying twitter is a great win for free speech, and probably changes the trajectory of the world more than most people realize. Twitter is upstream of media and culture in many ways, and it was trending in a very dangerous direction on censorship.
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1/ Today is a big moment for
@coinbase
as we become a public company. But it’s also a big one for crypto. This all started with the Bitcoin whitepaper 12 years ago, a deceptively simple 9 page document by Satoshi Nakamoto that ignited a global movement.
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1/ Today Coinbase received a Wells notice from the SEC focused on staking and asset listings. A Wells notice typically precedes an enforcement action.
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The Ripple case seems to be going better than expected. Meanwhile the SEC is realizing that attacking crypto is politically unpopular (because it harms consumers).
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If this is really some EA, decel, AI safety coup at OpenAI, the board just torched $80B of value, destroyed a shining star of American capitalism, and will be sued to high heaven by investors.
Every talented employee at OpenAI should quit and join Sam/Greg's new thing (if they
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1/ We're hearing rumors that the SEC would like to get rid of crypto staking in the U.S. for retail customers. I hope that's not the case as I believe it would be a terrible path for the U.S. if that was allowed to happen.
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Coinbase's staking services are not securities. We will happily defend this in court if needed.
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We will keep fighting for economic freedom (our mission at Coinbase). Some days being the most trusted brand in crypto means protecting our customers from government overreach.
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21/ Our door remains open. Hopefully the SEC steps up to create the clarity this industry deserves, without harming consumers and companies in the process. America could really use us all working together to figure this out right now.
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Since the founding of Coinbase back in 2012 we have taken a long-term view. I knew we needed to embrace compliance to become a generational company that stood the test of time. We got the licenses, hired the compliance and legal teams, and made it clear our brand was about trust
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It's stolen customer money used in his hedge fund, plain and simple.
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Met with the SEC today. We’ll continue pushing for a clear rule book in the U.S. for crypto regs.
The U.S. can’t afford to fall behind on this important technology to update the financial system.
Also important for regulators to set policy and THEN enforce it. Not start with
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1/ First off, I have a lot of sympathy for everyone involved in the current situation with FTX - it's stressful any time there is potential for customer loss.
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Apps are now recovering.
We had modeled a ~10x surge in traffic and load tested it. This exceeded that number.
It's expensive to keep services over-provisioned, but we'll need to keep working on auto-scaling solutions, and killing any remaining bottlenecks. Thank you for
We are dealing with a LARGE surge of traffic - apologies for any issues you encounter. The team is working to remediate.
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We are dealing with a LARGE surge of traffic - apologies for any issues you encounter. The team is working to remediate.
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Wow
The below clip is from a Fall 2018 Graduate MIT course called "Blockchain and Money"
Gary Gensler - the current President of the SEC, was the professor.
The Hypocrisy speaks for itself 🐀
"So we already know in the US and in many other jurisdictions that 3/4 of the market
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It's really crazy that Apple will unilaterally block you from running the software you want on your own device.
One of the most disrespectful parts of their culture, and it's damaging to their brand.
Removed from the App Store for enabling tipping to everyone in the world without the need for a bank, payment card, or government permission.
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Spent the day in DC meeting with members of congress. We need regulatory clarity in the U.S. for the centralized players in crypto for many reasons - consumer protection, national security, economic growth, etc.
The SEC has caused untold harm to America with its policy of
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Happy Bitcoin all time high! Another cycle, and once again the haters were wrong.
As always, trade responsibly.
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7/ Look….we're committed to following the law. Sometimes the law is unclear. So if the SEC wants to publish guidance, we are also happy to follow that (it's nice if you actually enforce it evenly across the industry equally btw).
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One idea I’ve been contemplating is that Bitcoin may be the key to extending western civilization.
The natural trend of whichever country has the reserve currency is to inflate the money supply and increase deficit spending until it loses that advantage. The U.S. is somewhere on
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8/ But in this case they are refusing to offer any opinion in writing to the industry on what should be allowed and why, and instead are engaging in intimidation tactics behind closed doors. Whatever their theory is here, it feels like a reach/land grab vs other regulators.
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20/ If we end up in court we may finally get the regulatory clarity the SEC refuses to provide. But regulation by litigation should be the last resort for the SEC, not the first.
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6/ They refuse to tell us why they think it's a security, and instead subpoena a bunch of records from us (we comply), demand testimony from our employees (we comply), and then tell us they will be suing us if we proceed to launch, with zero explanation as to why.
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1/ Starting today, Coinbase will begin integrating our crypto policy efforts right into our app. These will help our 103M verified users get educated on the crypto positions held by political leaders where they live.
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If you see FUD out there - remember, our financials are public (we're a public company)
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The U.S. needs to update its financial system. The code is 40 years old and the laws are 100 years old.
Cryptocurrency is not a financial service. It's a technology that can be used to update financial services.
Let's update the system.
Crypto can provide a meaningful update to the existing financial system and increase economic freedom in the world.
It's time to update the system. 🔁
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.
@Grayscale
deserves a huge amount of credit for today, pushing this through the courts
Absolute legends
We should all be grateful to
@Grayscale
for pushing back against the SEC’s arbitrary and capricious behavior, and clearing the way to get these spot BTC ETFs over the finish line. And of course to the DC Circuit, for affirming that the rule of law must prevail over politics. 2/3
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I have to say this SEC wells notice has caused a noticeable boost in morale.
Nice to have a common cause, but never forget the main goal is to build better products for our customers. Improving the policy landscape is necessary but not sufficient.
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If fiat backed stablecoins really become inflation coins (not so stable), then how will we get a coin that is truly stable?
Perhaps something that tracks a basket of real world goods (purchasing power parity) using oracles?
Ideas welcome.
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America risks losing it's status as a financial hub long term, with no clear regs on crypto, and a hostile environment from regulators.
Congress should act soon to pass clear legislation. Crypto is open to everyone in the world and others are leading. The EU, the UK, and now HK.
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12/ Ostensibly the SEC's goal is to protect investors and create fair markets. So who are they protecting here and where is the harm? People seem pretty happy to be earning yield on these various products, across lots of other crypto companies.
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15/ The SEC was the only regulator that refused to meet with me, saying "we're not meeting with any crypto companies". This was right after we became the first crypto company to go public in the U.S.
1/ I spent most of this week in DC meeting with members of Congress and heads of various federal agencies, along with
@RonConway
@katie_haun
and
@iampaulgrewal
.
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Interesting how crypto communities are congregating on Discord, which has traditionally been used for gaming. The intersection between gaming and crypto will be huge. (Reminder: it's also intersecting with art, finance, identity, governance, etc...Crypto is eating the world.)
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Nice small win. We went to court to challenge the SEC’s refusal to create clear rules for the industry – and it worked (a court compelled them to respond).
Now that they've formally responded (with a no!) we can challenge their response in court, which helps us get one step
Today the SEC denied Coinbase’s petition for rules for crypto. After 18 months of silence, we went to court to get the response the law requires. With appreciation for the Third Circuit, later today we'll again seek its help by challenging the SEC’s abdication of its duty. 🧵⬇️
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5/ They responded by telling us this lend feature is a security. Ok - seems strange, how can lending be a security? So we ask the SEC to help us understand and share their view. We always make an effort to work proactively with regulators, and keep an open mind.
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13/ Shutting these down would arguably be harming consumers more than protecting them, and by preventing Coinbase from launching the same thing that other companies already have live, they're creating an unfair market.
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11/ If you don't want this activity, then simply publish your position, in writing, and enforce it evenly across the industry.
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Coinbase is launching in Canada today! 🇨🇦
New leadership, new payment rails, new regulatory milestones, and 200 local employees.
Smart countries are embracing this technology (and creating regulatory clarity) to help update the financial system and drive economic growth.
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A few thoughts on our Q4 Earnings yesterday:
2023 was a great year for Coinbase and we’re in a strong financial position. We cut costs by 45% y/y and shipped products faster with a leaner team driving $95 million of positive net income for 2023, $964 million in positive Adj.
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10/ Gensler in his confirmation hearing: “It’s important for the SEC to provide guidance and clarity,” Gensler said. “Sometimes that’s a clarity that will be a thumbs up, but even if it’s thumbs down, it’s important to provide that.” March 2, 2021
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The UAE 🇦🇪 deserves a lot of credit for being forward thinking on crypto. First dedicated crypto regulator in the world, a clear rule book published (!), business friendly plus strong customer protections. Really enjoying my visit so far.
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Congratulations to new Argentina President Javier Milei
@JMilei
. Let’s talk about how we can help achieve economic freedom for the people of Argentina.
Living in Buenos Aires for a year, and learning about the history of Argentina, was part of what got me excited about Bitcoin.
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9/ Meanwhile, plenty of other crypto companies continue to offer a lend feature, but Coinbase is somehow not allowed to.
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The U.S. is squandering an early lead, in part because SBF embarrassed some politicians and regulators who now want to look tough on crypto. Pretty much everyone else has moved on though, and FTX is not really discussed in UK, UAE, etc.
The way to solve it is just get sensible
Greetings from
#Tokyo
where headline in
@japantimes
says exactly what I’m hearing across
#APAC
re:
#US
official policy on
#Crypto
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Another huge step forward for regulatory clarity: ETH is not a security! We’ve been saying it for years and today the SEC finally made it official.
Coinbase is proud to be the trusted partner and custodian powering 8 of the 9 newly approved ETH ETFs.
ETH ETFs have arrived.
Today, the SEC approved 9 spot ETH ETF applications. Their much celebrated arrival marks another important milestone for crypto in expanding access to and diversifying our cryptoeconomy.
Here’s why 🧵
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I’m in Washington D.C. and had a meeting canceled. Will be at the Dirksen Senate Office building snack bar for the next hour or so, if anyone wants to come chat about crypto and how we get crypto legislation + regulatory clarity this year.
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Well said. Hopefully this marks the beginning of the end for DEI as a movement, which got horribly corrupted by Marxist thought, and a return to a true meritocracy.
One thing not often discussed is it’s not just unethical to hire based on race/gender etc (and undermines the
In light of today’s news, I thought I would try to take a step back and provide perspective on what this is really all about.
I first became concerned about
@Harvard
when 34 Harvard student organizations, early on the morning of October 8th before Israel had taken any military
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Over 1M people have signed up for Coinbase NFT since we launched yesterday 🤯
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At
@coinbase
we don’t care if crypto is in a winter, or if people are pivoting to some new hot thing, we just keep showing up every day to build.
Progress toward important missions takes decades, and will have lots of ups and downs along the way. Persistence and determination
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19/ Yet here, we're being threatened with legal action before a single bit of actual guidance has been given to the industry on these products.
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2/ Millions of crypto holders have been earning yield on their assets over the last few years. It makes sense, if you want to lend out your funds, you can earn a return. Everyone seems happy.
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We’re looking into how to best add Lightning. It’s non-trivial, but I think worth doing. I’m all for payments taking off in Bitcoin.
Not sure why you think we’re ignoring Bitcoin - we’ve onboarded more people to Bitcoin than probably any company in the world.
Let’s build it
@brian_armstrong
Why do you continue to ignore bitcoin and lightning?
what "crypto" is a better money transmission protocol and why?
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@DaveVED_
Imagine you've got both football and soccer refs on the field, but we're actually playing pickleball (fastest growing new sport in America). The refs can't really agree on the rules of this new game, and one of them decides to change a call they made back in April 2021.
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Senators Warren and Marshall now lobbying for big banks 🙃
Being anti-crypto is a really bad political strategy going into 2024
* 52m Americans have used crypto
* 38% of young people say crypto can increase economic opportunities
* just 9% of Americans satisfied with the
Who could be so brazen as to write legislation that would effectively ban
#crypto
?
Senator
@RogerMarshallMD
, the GOP frontman of the crypto ban bill, revealed the American Bankers Association wrote it.
#StopCryptoBan
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10/ Contact your Senators and urge them to vote for the Wyden-Lummis-Toomey amendment and vote NO on the Warner-Portman amendment. Let’s keep crypto alive and thriving, we’re just getting started.
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Excited to see the crypto bowl today. (sounds like a lot of ads planned for crypto companies at the super bowl)
And Coinbase is no exception. Going to try something…a bit different. 😀
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Rewatched The Martian last night - what a great film. It’s one of the only tech positive films out there. There is no villain in the story. It cares about scientific accuracy instead of making up random nonsense. Imagine a society that had more of this in the culture.
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1/ I'm sharing the 10 ideas I'm most excited about in crypto right now. If you're building something in crypto or thinking about doing so - check it out.
We’re building lots at Coinbase, but we don't have time to tackle everything. So I figured I'd share these. Bear markets are
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The next step for crypto is to make payments instant and free globally.
This will take lots of work from all of us, Coinbase included, getting layer 2's integrated, better on-ramps, simpler UX/onboarding, etc.
A magic threshold would be getting the average payment under 1 cent
Welcome to the coffee shop of the future, where USDC payments are instant and gas-free with Coinbase Wallet.
And where customers order seamlessly via messaging, powered by
@XMTP_
.
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17/ We've always tried to be good actors in the space - leaning in to sensible regulation even when it is difficult or expensive. We try to think about what products we would want for ourselves, and what risks we would want our families to be aware of, before launching products.
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Major moment for crypto regulatory clarity in the U.S.
This has been a multi-year process toward approval, and we're excited to finally be launching federally regulated crypto derivatives with margin to our U.S. customers.
When there is a clear path to register, we do.
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Congrats and welcome to the club!
I’m long wells notice companies.
OpenSea has received a Wells notice from the SEC threatening to sue us because they believe NFTs on our platform are securities.
We're shocked the SEC would make such a sweeping move against creators and artists. But we're ready to stand up and fight.
Cryptocurrencies have long
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4/ We are proud to stand up for our customers and the industry in these moments.
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16/ Gensler had been confirmed just a month prior, so I brushed it off as the SEC still getting its feet under it. Now I'm not so sure.
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The team did a great job digging into this, and we've made the decision to integrate Lightning. Bitcoin is the most important asset in crypto and we're excited to do our part to enable faster/cheaper Bitcoin transactions. Will take some time to integrate so please be patient.
Friends, I'm happy to say that I'm leading up this effort. DM me if you'd like to grab some time to chat Lightning support at
@Coinbase
.
Particularly keen to get insights on lift to add support, UX flows, open source tooling, service providers, and edge cases. Thanks!
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Elizabeth Warren and WSJ spread misinformation on crypto and got caught red handed
The moment has passed, but voters won't forget
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3/ A bunch of great companies in crypto have been offering versions of this for years. Coinbase came out recently and said we would be launching our own version.
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14/ In May of this year I traveled to DC to meet with every regulator and branch of government I could.
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Bitcoin has become legal tender in El Salvador.
Now that one country has tipped, who will go next?
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5/ Going forward the legal process will provide an open and public forum before an unbiased body where we will be able to make clear for all to see that the SEC simply has not been fair, reasonable, or even demonstrated a seriousness of purpose when it comes to its engagement on
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Great progress on the SEC case - and huge win for self-custodial wallets. This ensures the onchain ecosystem will continue to innovate and create economic freedom around the world.
We'll continue fighting for your right to use crypto, and to get clarity around the rules, until
Today, the Court decided that our SEC case will move forward on most of the claims, but dismissed the claims against Coinbase Wallet. We were prepared for this, and we look forward to uncovering more about the SEC’s internal views and discussions on crypto regulation. 1/6
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4/ We were planning to go live in a few weeks, so we reached out to the SEC to give them a friendly heads up and briefing
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Coinbase is building out an office in India! 🇮🇳 Amazing team already in place - come join us.
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Wow - 71 dems voted Yes! A total victory
I was hearing anything in the 20-40 range would be considered a win.
This is a resounding win in the House for clear crypto rules, and a complete rejection of the nonsense being spouted by those who tried to kill
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It’s a great question
How is it even legal for the gov to approve coinbase to go public then to come back years later and say they're operating illegally?
Why was I allowed to buy the stock then? It's not like they changed how they operated since they were approved
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This is huge
Reducing transaction fees and confirmation times on Layer 2 will open up so many more use cases for crypto.
We're finally getting scalability.
after 2 years of hard work, blobs are now live on
@base
before: $0.31
after: $0.00 (but actually $0.0005)
wallets need to update to handle these cost reductions!
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3/ While we understand that this is all part of the journey to reforming our financial system, we are right on the law, confident in the facts, and welcome the opportunity for Coinbase (and by extension the broader crypto community) to get before a court.
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This is crazy - an inaccurate WSJ article (citing evidence from Elliptic) caused 20% of congress to sign a letter. Elliptic has now refuted the evidence in the WSJ article.
@WSJ
will you issue a retraction/correction?
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I met with more than a dozen Dem and GOP Senators in DC over the last 48 hrs to discuss creating clear rules for the crypto industry and consumer protection for crypto users. There’s strong bi-partisan momentum to get this done in the Senate now that FIT21 has passed in the
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A lot of folks don't realize that crypto is really the 3rd generation of the internet, re-decentralizing it. It is Web 3.
Fully aligned with the goals of financial inclusion and checking the power of big tech.
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Yes, I read it.
And then I wrote it (coding up our own Bitcoin node) to make sure I understood it.
$JPM's Jamie Dimon on bitcoin: "I'll just challenge the group to one other thing: how do you know it ends at 21 million? You all read the algorithms? You guys all believe that? I don't know, I've always been a skeptic of stuff like that."
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Thought this was AI generated at first but appears to be real
Get this man some Bitcoin 👏
"If you care about your fucking country, read Ludwig von Mises and the six lessons of the Austrian economic school, motherfuckers."
-
@moicanoufc
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