Today in crypto, the Bitcoin community shares mixed reactions to White House Crypto Summit, the White House Crypto Summit marked a “truly historic day at the White House,” according to Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek, and the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has reduced “the burden” on how US banks can engage with crypto-related activities.
Bitcoin community has mixed reactions to White House Summit
The Bitcoin (BTC) community voiced mixed reactions to the recent White House Crypto Summit, with some calling the event underwhelming and others characterizing the summit as a historic milestone for digital assets.
Retail investors and Bitcoin maximalists tended to have a more critical view of the Trump administration’s first White House Crypto Summit.
“The White House ‘crypto summit’ is a gathering of rent-seeking lobbyists pushing state-approved surveillance tokens,” BTC maximalist Justin Bechler wrote on X.
President Trump, cabinet members, and advisors address the White House Crypto Summit. Source: The White House
However, institutional investors and asset managers viewed the meeting much more positively and hailed it as a massive success.
Kyle Samani, the managing partner at Multicoin Capital, attended the summit — characterizing it as a “historic moment” for the digital asset industry. “We used to be fighting to stay alive. Now, we forge the path to lead the world in crypto,” Samani wrote.
Trump turned crypto from “oppressed industry” to “centerpiece” of US strategy
US President Donald Trump has placed cryptocurrency at the center of his economic strategy, marking a major policy shift for the US blockchain industry, according to Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek.
Trump hosted a White House Crypto Summit on March 7, signaling that he intends to make crypto policy a national priority and make the US a global hub for blockchain innovation.
The summit marked a “truly historic day at the White House,” Marszalek said in a March 8 X post.
Source: Kris|Crypto.com
Marszalek credited Trump with reversing policies like Operation Chokepoint 2.0, which allegedly led to crypto and tech firms being denied banking services under the Biden administration.
The difficulties of finding banking partners may indeed be a thing of the past for crypto firms after the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) eased its stance on how banks can engage with crypto just hours after Trump vowed to end the prolonged crackdown restricting crypto firms’ access to banking services.
OCC lays out crypto banking after Trump vows to end Operation Chokepoint 2.0
The US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has eased its stance on how US banks can engage with crypto just hours after US President Donald Trump vowed to end the prolonged crackdown restricting crypto firms’ access to banking services.
“Crypto-asset custody, certain stablecoin activities, and participation in independent node verification networks such as distributed ledger are permissible for national banks and federal savings associations,” the OCC said in a March 7 statement.
The OCC confirmed in a document titled Interpretive Letter 1183 that OCC-supervised financial institutions no longer need “supervisory nonobjection” to engage with crypto-related activities.
Source: Brian Armstrong
“Today’s action will reduce the burden on banks to engage in crypto-related activities and ensure that these bank activities are treated consistently by the OCC,” Acting Comptroller of the Currency Rodney E. Hood said.
The agency said it made the decision because OCC staff now have a better grasp of crypto and want to roll back its earlier stringent rules to “encourage responsible innovation and enhance transparency.”
