Andrew Yang, American Presidential Hopeful, Speaks Up for Bitcoin

Andrew Yang, former US-presidential hopeful, tweeted that he has backed Bitcoin, as he announced the launch of his new political outfit, the Forward Party. While tweeting with American businessman Jeff Booth, Yang said that he is a big supporter of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies in general. This statement from Yang comes months after he promised to transform New York City into a Bitcoin hub if he was elected the mayor. As of now, the US Federal Reserve is known to be looking at creating an official digital dollar.

Yang took to Twitter earlier this week to express his pro-crypto opinions after Booth asked him what the Forward Party planned on doing around cryptocurrencies.

This is not the first time however, that Yang has opened up about having the US explore the globally budding cryptocurrency space.

In November 2019, the former Democratic Party politician had posted a detailed blog on how he would draft frameworks to use and regulate cryptocurrencies on a national level. Yang, at the time, was making a base for his Presidential campaign.

“Other countries, which are ahead of us on regulation, are leading in this new marketplace and dictating the rules that we'll need to follow once we catch up,” Yang had noted, while highlighting that the number of crypto scams in the US were escalating due to lack of regulations.

In 2020, Yang allowed supporters to send donations for his Presidential campaign in Bitcoin and Ethereum – the world's most and second most-valued cryptocurrencies respectively.

The climate around cryptocurrencies seems to have been warming up in recent times. Like Yang, several cryptocurrency enthusiasts, have spoken up in favour of this decentralised financing protocol.

Earlier this month, the Bank of America published a report that acknowledged that the industries backed and based on cryptocurrencies have witnessed a major global explosion, making the space “too large to ignore”.

As per the research, nearly 221 million people have traded in cryptocurrencies in recent times – indicating a steady growth of the sector. Mergers and acquisitions in the crypto space also spiked from $940 million (roughly Rs. 7,025 crores) in 2020 to $4.2 billion (Rs. 31,390 crores) in 2021.

Last month, Jerome Powell, the Chairperson of US' Federal Reserve said that the central bank has no intensions of banning the crypto sector

The Miami city of the US also recently released its first native digital currency called the MiamiCoin.

Earlier this year, the central American country of El Salvador legalised Bitcoin as a legal tender alongside the US Dollar and became the first nation to do so.

Cryptocurrency is an unregulated digital currency, not a legal tender and subject to market risks. The information provided in the article is not intended to be and does not constitute financial advice, trading advice or any other advice or recommendation of any sort offered or endorsed by NDTV. NDTV shall not be responsible for any loss arising from any investment based on any perceived recommendation, forecast or any other information contained in the article.