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With the general counsel stepping down, some of the main characters in the crypto industry’s recent clashes with the Securities and Exchange Commission are out.
By Jesse Hamilton|Edited by Aoyon Ashraf
Jan 16, 2025, 10:07 p.m. UTC
What to know:
- The exit door is propped open at the Securities and Exchange Commission as most of the top officials — now including its general counsel — depart on the eve of President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the government.
- Trump’s newly appointed SEC leadership will have no holdovers to contend with among the agency’s senior legal officials.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s top lawyer, General Counsel Megan Barbero, will step away next week, joining the exodus of top agency officials who had been responsible for the SEC’s legal battles with the crypto industry in recent years.
“Her measured advice and judgment have been critical to the decision making of the Commission,” said Chair Gary Gensler, in a statement about Barbero’s exit, which is set for January 20. That’s the day Gensler, the author of the SEC’s crypto stance, is also leaving, just as President-elect Donald Trump is sworn in for a second term.
Barbero was the top lawyer at the agency, responsible for how its legal department conducted its disputes with crypto businesses in federal courts and for advising on its enforcement posture. She had served as general counsel since February 2023.
The SEC’s enforcement chief, Gurbir Grewal, left in October, and the accounting head who was behind the agency’s controversial crypto accounting policy, Paul Munter, also announced his pending departure this week.
Read More: Crypto’s U.S. Banking Problem Likely Among the First Things Tackled Under Trump
Jesse Hamilton is CoinDesk’s deputy managing editor on the Global Policy and Regulation team, based in Washington, D.C. Before joining CoinDesk in 2022, he worked for more than a decade covering Wall Street regulation at Bloomberg News and Businessweek, writing about the early whisperings among federal agencies trying to decide what to do about crypto. He’s won several national honors in his reporting career, including from his time as a war correspondent in Iraq and as a police reporter for newspapers. Jesse is a graduate of Western Washington University, where he studied journalism and history. He has no crypto holdings.
