Grayscale Investments, the world’s largest digital asset manager, has pledged $ 1 million to Coin Center, Washington, DC’s most influential cryptocurrency advocacy group – a move that it believes will help build the industry’s “fundamental knowledge” expand.
The million dollar donation was announced in a press release on Monday that also revealed Grayscale’s plan to round up contributions to the Coin Center by the end of February. During this period, Grayscale plans to raise donations, dollar for dollar, up to an additional $ 1 million.
Grayscale’s donation and match program was inspired by Kraken, the San Francisco-based exchange, which raised over $ 3 million for the Coin Center in 2018. That included $ 2 million in direct support from Kraken.
“The Coin Center has played a key role in advocating issues affecting our ecosystem,” Grayscale told Cointelegraph.
The asset manager added that “Coin Center has made two strong comments in the past two months that have played a key role in correcting issues in proposed regulation by the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) that are seriously detrimental to self-employment have had. hosted wallet users and the entire digital currency industry. “
Coin Center is a leading think tank focused on advancing public policy issues in the digital asset and blockchain space. In 2017, the advocacy group visited Congress to demonstrate how Bitcoin works to legislators. Last year the organization reached out to the cryptocurrency community to ensure that the COVID-19 era lockdown measures did not encroach on civil liberties and privacy.
When asked about the most urgent legal work needed for the crypto industry today, Grayscale said:
“Education is what counts. Regulators need a basic understanding of a subject to make informed decisions about the bills that go through their desks. Education is both the biggest challenge and the biggest opportunity for our industry when it comes to policy makers. “
Neeraj Agrawal, the Coin Center’s communications director, told Cointelegraph that he was “overwhelmed by the continued support from the community and industry” for advocacy. “We will use these funds to continue to represent Bitcoin, Ethereum and cryptocurrency in general in DC,” he said.
Over the coming year, the Coin Center plans to continue to focus on improving financial privacy and “more sensible tax policies,” said Agrawal.
