21st April 2025 > > Oregon & Charles Schwab.

tl;dr

The State of Oregon did not get the memo. Charles Schwab is making its crypto move.

Market Snap

Market Wrap

The (very) thin online equities markets are showing signs of stress before tomorrows’ open whilst BTC had a nice little pump just three hours ago, bringing the techies out in force:

Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – Oregon

Having previously given its approval for the public launch of Coinbase, the SEC later did the dirty by filing a lawsuit against Coinbase alleging the sale of unregistered securities. That case was recently dropped, but it seems that not everyone has realised that the last US election signposted a fundamental shift in the regulatory landscape for cryptos.

Oregon has filed its own lawsuit against Coinbase. Paul Grewal, Chief Legal Officer at Coinbase, makes his displeasure plain:

"In case you think I’m jumping to conclusions, the attorney general's office made it clear to us that they are literally picking up where the Gary Gensler SEC left off — seriously. This is exactly the opposite of what Americans should be focused on right now."

The next Crypto Task Force roundtable is scheduled for this Friday, with the last one due in the first week of June. That will shortly be followed by a report and recommendations for the regulation of cryptos at a federal level, superseding any state level rules. Given the urgency and the priority that the new administration is allowing cryptos, legislation should be quick to pass. It seems that there is zero chance of this lawsuit reaching a conclusion before it becomes redundant.

This looks to be both a stupendous waste of taxpayers’ dollars, and a most unwelcome reminder that there remains a residual element of partisanship when it comes to cryptos, which is a real shame.

Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – Charles Schwab

The appointment of Rick Wurster as the new CEO of Charles Schwab last year met with the CCC’s approval (https://www.curiouscryptos.com/post/23rd-november-2024-the-sec-charles-schwab). Rick stated upfront “We also would like to directly offer crypto” but that his firm needed to see a clearer regulatory landscape, which he was hopeful would soon come to pass.

Charles Schwab has partnered with TMTG (Trump Media and Technology Group) to manage a quarter of billion dollars of TMTG’s reserves across several asset classes including “Bitcoin and similar cryptocurrencies or crypto-related securities.” Longer term, the intention is to roll out the sale of ETFs, managed accounts, and cryptos to TMTG’s client base, using Charles Schwab as the executor and custodian.

Charles Schwab has AUM of $9.6 TRILLION and $33.7bn on a non-discretionary basis, with over 36mm customers. It is no minnow in the asset management game. Its website proudly claims that:

“Charles Schwab is the 3rd largest provider of mutual funds, 5th largest provider of ETFs, and 7th largest provider of money market funds.”

Rick has greater ambitions in the crypto sphere other than just leveraging off TMTG:

“Our expectation is that with the changing regulatory environment, we are hopeful and likely to be able to launch direct spot crypto. Our goal is to do that in the next 12 months, and we are on a great path to be able to do that.”

My estimate that 3-5% of all investment monies will flow into cryptos, mostly BTC, has largely been borne out by the statistics we see from those pockets of money that have adopted cryptos. Charles Schwab will be bringing 300-500bn of new money into cryptos, mostly BTC, within 12 months, a significant chunk when compared to the current market cap of BTC at $1.8 TRILLION. The laggards and naysayers in the investment industry are starting to look very worried indeed about their prospects.

Crypto adoption wherever you look.