Coinbase CEO Backs ‘Stand with Crypto’ NFT Campaign

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong has backed a campaign urging the crypto community to unite in their efforts to have the government and regulators establish clear rules for the nascent industry.

The crypto exchange chief took to Twitter late Monday to share that he had minted a “Stand with Crypto” NFT at the Zora marketplace.

“The Stand with Crypto commemorative NFT is a symbol of unity for the crypto community seeking sensible crypto policy,” reads the NFT description.

The NFT showcases a blue shield, which symbolizes a unified effort to safeguard and advance the possibilities of cryptocurrency.

“The blue shield not only shows your support for the cause but also that you’re part of a growing community who believes in the future of crypto. This is a purely commemorative NFT with an open mint and has no intended utility or value,” the project’s page on Zora states.

Crypto community “fired up”

In a separate Twitter thread, Coinbase said that “the community is clearly fired up about sensible crypto policy.”

The exchange added that those wishing to join the campaign can do so by minting a commemorative NFT and adding a shield emoji next to their Twitter username.

According to Coinbase, all proceeds associated with the “Stand With Crypto” NFT collection will be donated to “vetted organizations,” including crypto lobbyist and educational organizations, such as the DeFi Education Fund, the Blockchain Association, CoinCenter, and the Blockchain Foundation.

The move came hours after America’s largest crypto exchange filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) seeking to compel the agency to publicly answer a nearly year-old petition on the crypto regulation.

Filed in July 2022 after the SEC claimed that nine tokens available on Coinbase were unregistered securities, the Coinbase petition sought answers to 50 specific questions that would provide “clarity and certainty regarding the regulatory treatment of digital asset securities.”

According to Coinbase chief legal officer Paul Grewal, the SEC is required by law to respond to petitions “within a reasonable time.”

“We are simply requesting that the Court order the SEC to respond at all, which they are legally obligated to do,” Grewal wrote in a blog post Monday, adding that Coinbase is not asking the court to tell the commission how to respond.