Paul Atkins, Trump’s SEC Nominee, Consulted for Wall Street, Crypto
As he courted cryptocurrency investors last year, Donald Trump promised to fire Gary Gensler, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chair who had scrutinized the industry, and install a new crypto-friendly regulator in his place.
Trump, who launched his own crypto meme coin days before he took office, didn’t just select an industry ally to lead the SEC — he chose one of its biggest boosters in Washington, Paul Atkins. According to his new financial disclosure, Atkins co-chaired a crypto advocacy group, consulted for crypto interests, and has significant crypto holdings.
The filing shows Atkins, the CEO of Patomak Global Partners, has consulted for many companies that are subject to the SEC’s oversight — including numerous big banks, such as Bank of America, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs; financial firms like Fidelity Investments, Guggenheim Securities, Invesco, and the Jefferies Group; and the oil and gas giant ExxonMobil. He also represented the Business Roundtable, a lobbying group for big business CEOs.
As for his involvement with the crypto industry, the disclosure lists the crypto prime broker FalconX Holdings as one of Atkins’ clients. Atkins, who was the SEC chair under George W. Bush, has served as the co-chair of the Token Alliance at the Digital Chamber, a lobbying group for the blockchain industry. He’s listed as a member of the board of advisors at Securitize Inc., which describes itself as “the first fully digital securities issuance platform.” And he holds up to $5 million in a fund from Off the Chain Capital, a crypto investment firm.
Atkins’ firm, Patomak Global Partners, previously advised the defunct crypto exchange FTX — whose founder Sam Bankman-Fried was convicted on fraud and conspiracy charges after the company’s implosion.
Bloomberg News reported that Atkins and his spouse are worth up to $327 million, based on the financial disclosure. His stake in Patomak Global Partners is valued at somewhere between $25 million and $50 million, and generated $3.7 million in income last year, according to the filing. He has pledged to divest his stake in the firm following his confirmation.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), the ranking member on the Senate Banking Committee, said in a statement Tuesday that Atkins’ “client list reads as a who’s who of Wall Street special interests.”
Noting that Atkins has pledged to sell his interest in the firm, Warren said “that is not enough, unless he agrees to disclose to Congress who the buyer will be and whether they are paying for access to the SEC chair.”
The Senate Banking Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing on Atkins’ nomination on Thursday.
