10-20-2026 
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TL;DR: Patrick Witt has left the White House Crypto Council, which is now unstaffed, and the WSJ reports that Tether paid $6.3 million to Bo Hines’ firm, Nuxum, while he led the Council. Meanwhile, the CFTC is fighting CME’s perpetual futures suit, a judge has refused to undo the CFTC-Gemini settlement, the SEC says enforcement lives on, and more companies are opting out of OKXICE tokenization.
Key Takeaways:
- Patrick Witt left the White House Crypto Council on October 14, leaving it without staff.
- Bo Hines’ Tether ties preceded GENIUS passage: Tether’s $6.3 million Nuxum deal was signed in May 2025, while he was Council director.
- The CFTC is still trying to dismiss CME’s perpetual futures suit, arguing CME shows no real competitive injury.
- A judge rejected the CFTC-Gemini bid to undo their $5 million settlement.
- The SEC insists enforcement is still a thing, focusing on fraud and intentional misconduct.
- OKXICE tokenization objections are growing: nine firms have opted out, and Nasdaq says it will too.
The White House’s ‘crypto council’ is currently unmanned, its former director’s ties to stablecoin issuer Tether began a lot earlier than people suspected, and more public companies are saying ‘no’ to third-party tokenization.
On October 14, Patrick Witt confirmed that he was stepping down as executive director of the White House’s Council of Advisers on Digital Assets, aka the ‘Crypto Council.’ Witt said “serving in this administration has been the privilege of a lifetime,” and thanked President Trump “for the opportunity to serve the American people again in your second term” while helping to realize Trump’s vision to “make the the United States the ‘crypto capital of the world.’”
Witt also thanked Paul Atkins and Michael Selig, chairmen of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), respectively, along with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and numerous members of Congress who played prominent roles in “advancing crypto policy over the past year.”
This advance included last year’s successful passage of the stablecoin-focused GENIUS Act, but also this year’s failure by the Senate to advance the CLARITY Act, the digital asset market structure legislation. While the CFTC and SEC are doing their best to recover this fumble and move the crypto ball downfield, regulatory tweaks can be undone far more easily by future administrations than Congress-approved legislation.
It’s unclear what Witt’s departure means for both the Crypto Council and the White House’s crypto focus, as no one currently staffs the Council. Two other execs exited the council this summer, including deputy director Harry Jung, who subsequently joined the Nuxum Group consultancy.
Witt’s tenure as exec director began following the August 2025 departure of Bo Hines, who left three weeks after Trump signed GENIUS into law. The following month, Hines joined the U.S. offshoot of Tether, issuer of the market-leading USDT stablecoin. Tether U.S. subsequently launched (USAT), a GENIUS-compliant stablecoin with a market cap of just 1% of USDT’s $183.5 billion.
Hines, along with his father, Todd Hines, and a third party, Gary Dennis, co-owns the Nuxum Group, to which former Council deputy Jung decamped. Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that Tether had paid Nuxum $6.3 million from a deal negotiated while Hines was still Council director. At least $2.5 million of this sum was paid while Hines was still working at the White House.
The Nuxum-Tether “strategic brand and public affairs plan” was proposed in April 2025 and signed that May, while Hines was actively lobbying for changes to GENIUS that would primarily benefit Tether. Among these changes was a doubling of the original 18-month post-GENIUS grace period, during which U.S. crypto firms seeking to transact with ‘payment stablecoins’ would have to abandon non-compliant tokens like USDT.
Signal messages obtained by the Journal show Hines discussing GENIUS details with his Nuxum partners, who then discussed the matter with Tether’s CEO, Paolo Ardoino. A Nuxum spokesperson said Hines recused himself from Nuxum operations, although his Council role didn’t require him to divest his one-third stake in Nuxum.
The deal was facilitated by Peter Vincer, a ‘marketing entrepreneur’ that Nuxum has used in other deals. The initial $2.5 million payment was paid in USDT via the Tether-affiliated digital asset exchange Bitfinex. Vincer kept $498,000 of this initial payment. Subsequent payments were sent directly to Nuxum.
Vincer signed the Tether contract over to Nuxum after Hines left the White House, but now says Nuxum failed to honor its promise to make additional payments. Or, as Hines put it via a Signal message to Vincer, “everyone has agreed that you are never to be f–ed.”
In August 2026, Vincer said Nuxum offered him $311,000 and a 21% share of a coming Tether payment to Nuxum if he agreed to keep quiet regarding his dealings with Tether, Nuxum, Hines, and others involved in the deal. Vincer didn’t sign, and Nuxum partner Dennis later accused Vincer of spreading “lies” to journalists about the Nuxum-Tether deal.
The Journal reported that Nuxum recently began circulating a pitch deck to potential investors, indicating that Tether planned to serve as an “anchor investor” with a 25% stake in Nuxum valued at $56 million. The pitch deck describes Nuxum as the “strategic media infrastructure layer behind Tether.”
Nuxum has also received over $6.5 million from the Fellowship PAC, the political action committee launched last year by Tether and its Wall Street partner Cantor Fitzgerald (NASDAQ: ZCFITX). Ahead of the launch, Nuxum partner Dennis messaged an associate saying Fellowship’s ties to Nuxum, Tether, and Bo Hines weren’t to be made public.
Neither Hines nor Tether’s Ardoino has yet to comment on the report.
Witt has yet to indicate whether he might follow the revolving door template established by Hines and former acting CFTC chair Caroline Pham, who joined crypto fintech Moonpay last December after her significant efforts to lower the regulatory drawbridge for all things crypto. Witt’s resignation tweet said only that he’d “have more to share soon” about his future employment.
CFTC v CME
Current CFTC chair Selig continues to do his utmost to ensure a smooth regulatory ride for crypto operators, including last week’s proposals to define a federally regulated market for crypto platforms trading pretty much anything.
On October 16, the CFTC filed a new brief in its fight against the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) over who gets to allow perpetual futures contracts in the U.S. In May, the CFTC authorized the Kalshi prediction market to begin offering a BTC-based perp, then authorized other CFTC licensees, including the Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN)digital asset exchange, to convert their existing ‘perpetual style digital commodity futures contracts’ into true perps.
The CME promptly filed a lawsuit challenging the CFTC’s authority to issue such authorizations, in part based on the CME’s argument that the perps were swaps, not futures, and widening that definition horned in on the CME’s exclusive turf, thereby inflicting economic injury on the CME.
The CFTC responded in September by asking the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to dismiss the CME’s suit, rubbishing the CME’s “vague assertions of competitive injury.” The CFTC also used the CME’s own statements against it, noting that the CME previously stated on an earnings call that its customers weren’t interested in the type of crypto futures Kalshi sought to offer.
The CFTC’s latest filing expands on these arguments, saying the CME has failed to “plausibly allege an actual or imminent increase in competition.”
TD Cowen analysts said at the time that the CME’s case was strong, noting that the CFTC had authorized these other platforms to offer perps before the regulator had issued new regulations detailing its new approach. TD Cowen’s Jaret Seiberg maintained this view in a new note on Monday, but warned that the ongoing growth in perp volume “could create complications in trying to unwind this market if the CME prevails.”
The CFTC indicated this summer that it plans to redesign its rules to allow the Singapore-based Hyperliquid platform to launch a ‘legal and compliant’ U.S. offshoot. Last month, the Hyperliquid Policy Center filed an amicus brief urging the D.C. court to dismiss the CME suit, accusing CME of “blocking innovation in the futures market.”
Federal judge rejects CFTC’s bid to let Gemini off the hook
With CLARITY’s chances of being revived in the post-midterm election’s ‘lame duck’ session of Congress considered slim to GTFO, changing as much of the reality on the ground as possible seems to be the modus operandi of both the CFTC and SEC. But the courts are pushing back on some of these freewheeling moves.
On October 15, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York rejected a joint motion by the CFTC and the Gemini (NASDAQ: GEMI) digital asset platform to set aside the $5 million settlement that Gemini and the CFTC’s previous leadership reached in January 2025.
That settlement was based on the CFTC’s conclusion that Gemini had lied about the finances underpinning the platform’s BTC-based exchange-traded product. In May 2026, Gemini and Selig’s CFTC sought to abandon “continuing enforcement of the consent order’s prospective provisions,” based on the CFTC’s current view that the original complaint “should not have been filed.”
Tough noogies, said U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, who said neither Gemini nor the CFTC had presented evidence sufficient to clear the legal hurdles needed to relieve a party from a final judgment, order, or proceeding.
The parties had argued that (a) the CFTC unfairly pressured Gemini to settle, and (b) the new-look CFTC under Selig wouldn’t have filed the complaint in the first place.
Hellerstein added that “the underlying facts on which [Gemini and CFTC] rely are not post-judgment developments. They concern the merits—the misrepresentations of Gemini, the Winklevoss brothers [Cameon and Tyler, Gemini’s owners], and the whistleblower, and the Commission’s internal deliberations, and not the [CFTC’s] conduct before and during the litigation.”
Hellerstein emphasized that Gemini “litigated the case for approximately three years, and then, despite the preceding facts, made the calculated decision to settle the case shortly before trial.” Gemini’s “receipt of additional materials [showing Gemini execs were running an internal fraud] after the fact may have caused it to regret that it settled, but it did not create a post-judgment change in factual circumstances” sufficient to overturn the settlement.
Hellerstein indirectly addressed the ‘boots on the ground’ argument, noting that executive orders issued by Trump and a memo issued by the Deputy U.S. Attorney General “collectively constitute a change in enforcement priorities and policies, but not a ‘significant change … in law.’” In other words, until the laws are changed, courts will continue to respect the laws on the books.
However, Hellerstein offered the parties an out, noting that the CFTC’s new management (which, for the past year, is simply Selig, as Trump hasn’t nominated anyone to fill the four empty commissioner seats) “retains discretion over its enforcement priorities and remains free to account for its current policies in deciding whether to seek enforcement” of the settlement.
Repeat after us: SEC enforcement is not dead as the dodo
Both the CFTC and SEC have come under fire since Trump took office for the second time for their perceived lack of interest in bringing new enforcement cases, particularly against crypto operators. Former SEC enforcement directors have publicly criticized the SEC’s alleged moves to pad its dismal enforcement stats prior to the end of its most recent fiscal year on September 30.
On October 16, the SEC released a video interview with Atkins and current SEC enforcement director David Woodcock regarding the agency’s ‘back to basics’ enforcement approach.
Woodcock told Atkins that ‘back to basics’ means “looking for real investor harm, looking for real intentional misconduct, and looking for opportunities to return money back to investors when we can identify that harm and recover those funds.” Critics might suggest that it involves closing the barn door long after the cows have fled rather than taking a more proactive stance, but let ‘em cook.
Woodcock said the SEC would continue to target garden-variety fraud, financial reporting fraud, insider trading, Ponzi schemes, and investment advisers with conflicts of interest or who fail to disclose critical material to investors. But his sole ‘crypto’ references were to cases involving outright fraudsters luring in suckers with the promise of investing on trading platforms that don’t actually exist.
Woodcock insisted that it’s misguided to believe “we don’t bring cases around emerging technologies. We absolutely do. But you’re looking for people who are taking advantage of these innovative approaches, and abusing them to rip people off.”
For the record, Woodcock was appointed to his current role in April, after Margaret Ryan resigned as enforcement director after just six months on the job, reportedly due to her frustration at the SEC’s unwillingness to probe President Trump’s highly profitable crypto ventures.
Tokenization still viewed with suspicion
Presumably, the SEC intends to enforce its own rules regarding publicly traded companies being allowed to ‘opt out’ of having their shares tokenized by third-party platforms and offered for trading globally on a 24/7/365 basis.
The SEC received its first application for its new tokenized securities venue (TSV) category this month via OKXICE, the joint venture of digital asset exchange OKX and Intercontinental Exchange Holdings (NYSE: ICE), parent company of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).
The application OKXICE filed on October 4 listed 63 companies whose shares it wants to tokenize, with the caveat that the listed firms had 30 days in which to object to this activity. The application noted that one of these firms, AI infrastructure and semiconductor firm Cerebras Systems Inc (CBRS), had already objected to having its shares tokenized.
On October 15, OKXICE updated its filing to say that it has received Notices of Issuer Objection from eight more firms, including AI infrastructure firm CoreWeave (NASDAQ: CRWV), semiconductor producer Broadcom (NASDAQ: AVGO), telecom giant Verizon Communications (NASDAQ: VZ), and healthcare giant UnitedHealth Group (NASDAQ: UNH).
Companies that object aren’t required to specify (at least, not publicly) why they’re opting out. But the company behind the Nasdaq exchange on which most of these companies are traded stated on September 29 that it too will opt out of having its shares tokenized, “as the consequences for liquidity, price discovery, and long-term shareholder value may not become apparent until well after the experiment is underway.”
Nasdaq said that “while we laud steps to bring America’s capital markets into the digital age … experimentation should not fragment liquidity, weaken the link between trading interest and the public price of a company’s shares, or create a parallel market structure without the safeguards needed to operate responsibly at scale.”
FAQs:
Why did Patrick Witt leave the White House Crypto Council?
Witt confirmed his exit on October 14 but gave no reason. He said only that he’d have more to share about his future soon.
How much did Tether pay Bo Hines’ company?
The WSJ reports $6.3 million to Nuxum, with at least $2.5 million paid while Hines was at the White House. Nuxum says he recused himself.
Why is the CFTC fighting CME’s perpetual futures lawsuit?
CME says perps are swaps, not futures. The CFTC wants the case dismissed, saying CME hasn’t shown actual or imminent competitive harm.
Why did a judge reject the CFTC-Gemini settlement bid?
Judge Hellerstein ruled that new enforcement priorities aren’t a significant change in law. The CFTC can still choose not to enforce.
Which companies are opting out of OKXICE tokenization?
Cerebras, CoreWeave, Broadcom, Verizon, and UnitedHealth, among others. Nasdaq has also said it will opt out, citing liquidity and price discovery risks.
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