Howard Lutnick, CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald and President-elect Trump’s choice for Commerce Secretary, wants to start a $2 billion project to let clients borrow dollars against Bitcoin
As part of the deal, Tether, the company making the world’s biggest stablecoin, would help pay for the cantor Fitzgerald project.
The Wall Street Journal says the promised program will likely cost tens of billions of dollars.
Cantor Fitzgerald is Tether’s security provider for the billions of dollars in U.S. Treasuries that back the USDT stablecoin. The story also says that Cantor bought about 5% of Tether, worth $600 million.
Cantor has already started hiring people for the lending scheme, but lending has yet to formally begin.
As Lutnick prepares to move to the Commerce Department, he wants to give his coworkers control over the company’s Tether relationship. His son, Brandon Lutnick, works as a Cantor trader and was an intern at Tether’s office in Lugano, Switzerland.
This comes when Trump’s transition team thinks about making a new post in the White House for crypto policy. Trump has recently come out as a strong backer of digital assets. He pushed projects with which his kids were involved, like World Liberty Financial. If approved, Lutnick would be in charge of almost 47,000 people who work in commerce. They would be in charge of everything from the Census Bureau to trade promotion.
Even with the changes, Tether is still closely watched by regulators for possible sanctions and money laundering concerns violations, which the company rejects. But, despite the claims, USDT is still the biggest stablecoin, with a market cap of over $132 billion.
Over the years, Trump and Lutnick have kept a professional and friendly friendship. This is mainly because they both work in finance and real estate.
In addition to meeting people at events over the years, Lutnick also put on parties for Trump when he ran for president.
