The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is putting serious pressure on cryptocurrency exchanges. The company that benefited the most from this was Binance. BinanceUS is now continuing its fight in the court halls. Brian Brooks, former CEO of this company, has transferred to a new cryptocurrency company.
BinanceUS CEO Transferred
Brian Brooks, former Currency Comptroller of the United States government, has joined the board of directors of cryptocurrency-focused asset manager Hashdex. In an announcement made on July 20th, Hashdex stated that Brooks is the fifth member of the board of directors and will serve as a strategic advisor to the company. Brooks served as Coinbase’s Chief Legal Officer from 2018 to 2020, Deputy Currency Comptroller from 2020 to 2021, worked as CEO of BinanceUS for about four months, and was the CEO of Bitfury from October 2021 to December 2022.
Marcelo Sampaio, co-founder and CEO of Hashdex, cited Brooks’ experience in the “financial regulation and cryptocurrency industry” as the reason for joining the board of directors. Brooks is currently working as a managing partner at the venture capital firm Valor Capital Group, which has previously supported various cryptocurrency companies through various financing rounds.
Binance Selects the Most Valuable
Although Brooks has left the company, BinanceUS continues to employ former regulatory agency executives to mitigate the impact of current or potential issues. Binance is incorporating names from within to weaken the effects of problems it faces or may face.
The former BinanceUS CEO commented on his new role as follows:
“Cryptocurrency assets are changing the economies of almost every industry worldwide and allowing individuals to have ownership stakes in the networks they participate in. I am eagerly looking forward to helping Hashdex realize its vision of bridging the gap between traditional financial markets and the crypto economy.”
Brooks’ brief tenure as CEO of BinanceUS in 2021, when he took over from former CEO Catherine Coley, surprised many in the crypto space. At that time, Brooks cited “differences in strategic direction” as the reason. However, in a lawsuit filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission against Binance in June, it was alleged that Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao did not grant Brooks autonomy to manage the US exchange.
