Who’s Kevin Hassett, Trump’s Reported Crypto-friendly Pick For The...

Kevin Hassett, a White House economic adviser, has reportedly emerged as a leader among the Trump administration’s short list to replace Jerome Powell.

US President Donald Trump is slated to choose a new Federal Reserve chair by Christmas, and the frontrunner, Kevin Hassett, could be a boon for the crypto industry.

Hassett is a White House economic adviser who has reportedly emerged as a strong candidate for the Fed chair position. He is the director of the National Economic Council and oversaw the digital asset working group directed by the White House earlier this year.

Trump has been trying to increase his administration’s control over the Federal Reserve, the country’s central bank, thereby expanding the White House’s influence over monetary policy.

The nomination process has not yet begun, but observers are already speculating about what a Hassett chairmanship could mean for US monetary policy and crypto.

Hassett was an assistant professor of economics at the Columbia Business School in the 1990s. While there, he also served as an economist in the Division of Research and Statistics at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. He was also a policy consultant with the Department of the Treasury under the administrations of former presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton.

Hassett briefly sat on the White House Council of Economic Advisors during the first Trump administration. During the president’s second term, Hassett served as director of the National Economic Council (NEC), a part of the executive branch that the president uses for setting domestic and international economic policy.

Despite a lack of clear public statements, Hassett is widely regarded as pro-crypto. In June, he revealed a stake of at least $1 million in Coinbase and that he was compensated at least $50,001 for his role on the exchange’s Academic and Regulatory Advisory Council.

The NEC, where he serves as director, oversaw the development of the White House’s digital asset working group, which published a paper earlier this year outlining the administration’s policy on crypto.

The Fed doesn’t oversee securities or commodities, so its policy changes can’t affect crypto regulation. But a crypto-friendly Fed could still have a positive impact on the industry in several ways.

Source: CoinTelegraph