Tag: CEO

Overstock CEO: Crypto Investments Are Ready for Prime Time

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Overstock CEO and Medici Ventures President Jonathan Johnson has been betting on crypto companies for most of the last decade. Now he believes these investments are finally ready to enter the real world. In an interview at the Digital Money Forum during CES 2020, Johnson talked about Medici’s portfolio of companies and said many of them are shipping products. He still believes, however, the ecosystem is being driven by early adopters. “There will always be early adopters who take it and it will become more widespread. I think we’re in…

LedgerX Names Former Chief Tech Officer as New CEO

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LedgerX announced Friday that co-founder and former chief technology officer Zach Dexter has been named the new CEO of the bitcoin derivatives company. The company suspended CEO Paul Chou and COO/CRO Juthica Chou last month, with no explanation. The two were also co-founders of the company. Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation vice chairman Larry Thompson was named interim CEO and lead director of Ledger Holdings. In a statement, Thompson said, “since my involvement with the company began, we have kept in close contact with all of the company’s stakeholders including…

Blockchain Social Media Startup Voice Hires Ex Forbes Exec as CEO

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Ahead of its upcoming public beta launch, decentralized social media platform Voice announced that it hired former Forbes chief digital officer, Salah Zalatimo, as its new CEO, according to a press release, Jan. 9. Zalatimo joined Forbes in 2015 and led a successful digital transformation, rebuilding the Forbes platform from the ground up. Block.one CEO, Brendan Blumer, gave his thoughts on the new hire: “Salah is a rare combination of product and media talent enriched by an entrepreneurial past. His experience in creating state-of-the-art content monetization and publishing tools makes…

Former Mt Gox CEO Mark Karpeles Seeks to Put Longstanding Lawsuit to Rest

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Mark Karpeles, the former CEO of the now-defunct Bitcoin (BTC) exchange Mt. Gox, is seeking to put an end to litigation filed by a former exchange user back in 2014.  In papers filed in a Chicago federal court on Jan. 8, Karpeles contended that he is entitled to summary judgment as the main plaintiff in the case as Gregory Greene readily admitted that his initial claims were either untrue or unsupported.  A summary judgment can be awarded by a court on behalf of one party against another “summarily” – i.e.…

Former Bakkt CEO and New US Senator Loeffler Will Help Oversee CFTC

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Former Bakkt CEO and Georgia’s new Senator Kelly Loeffler will help oversee major financial regulator, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Sworn into the United States Senate on Jan. 6, the crypto-friendly businesswoman has joined the Senate Agriculture Committee, which oversees the CFTC. The news was first reported by farm and policy publication Agri-Pulse on Jan. 6, while the official announcement was released on Jan. 7. Potential conflict of interest: CFTC regulates ICE’s markets Loeffler’s appointment to the agriculture committee is potentially setting up a conflict of interest as the…

Former Bakkt CEO to Help Oversee CFTC in Congress

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The former chief executive of bitcoin derivatives exchanges Bakkt is to join the committee that oversees the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), raising concerns of a possible conflict of interest. The newly appointed senator, Kelly Loeffler (R., Ga.), will serve on the Senate Agricultural Committee, which is responsible for defining the CFTC’s remit and approving nominations for commissioners and chairmen. It also includes reauthorizing the CFTC as a federal regulator. Loeffler was appointed CEO of Bakkt when it launched under its parent company Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) in August 2018. Under…

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong Predicts Rise of Privacy Coins in Upcoming Decade

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In a blog post titled ‘What will happen to cryptocurrency in the 2020s’ published on January 3rd, Brian Armstrong, the co-founder and CEO of Coinbase, discussed cryptocurrency and its future. Armstrong wrote in the post that he thinks one of the popular blockchain networks will see an increase in privacy features and stated that he believes privacy coins will undergo a mainstream adoption in the coming decade. Armstrong further elaborates in the blog post that similar to how the launch of HTTP with the internet has only later become HTTPS…

Former Bakkt CEO Sworn Into Senate, Casts 1st Vote to Support Trump

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Kelly Loeffler, former CEO at the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE)-backed crypto trading platform Bakkt, has been sworn into the United States Senate. In a Jan. 6 tweet, Loeffler announced that she was sworn into the U.S. Senate by Mike Pence, the Senate’s chief officer, to become Georgia’s newest Senator. Loeffler casts first vote to support Trump’s pickto lead the Small Business Administration In the announcement, Loeffler said that she had already cast her first vote to support U.S. President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Small Business Administration, an autonomous U.S.…

Blockchain Bandwagon Company Longfin CEO Settles with US SEC for $400,000

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Venkata S. Meenavalli, an Indian ex-CEO of a once Nasdaq-listed American fintech firm Longfin, has settled with the US Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) for conducting a $27 million accounting fraud scheme to inflate the revenue of the now-defunct cryptocurrency company in order to get it listed on the Nasdaq. The company’s share price jumped some 2,500 percent in 2017 after jumping on the Blockchain bandwagon and announcing a blockchain pivot during the height of the bubble.  The Longfin CEO has agreed to pay $400,000 in disgorgement and penalties to…

CEO of Crypto Firm Longfin to Pay $400K in Settlement with SEC

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An update from the courtroom shows that Venkata S. Meenavalli, the CEO of the embattled crypto firm Longfin, has finally yielded to paying a disgorgement fine of $400,000. The case filed against the supposed cryptocurrency firm last year by the SEC at the US district court for the southern district of New York alleged that Longfin Corp. and its acting chief executive officer misinterpreted their finances and lied to obtain a listing on the Nasdaq. According to the complaint, Longfin CEO Meenavalli created and managed a scheme that helped him…