Another Regulator Moves to Crypto World as JST Hires From New York Fed

Yet another regulator is heading off to join the crypto world.

Martin Grant, who served as the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s chief compliance and ethics officer for more than 15 years, has joined JST Capital, a financial services firm for digital assets.

Grant, who spent more than three decades at the New York Fed, will head regulatory affairs for JST, the company said in a statement. His role will be to navigate the changing regulatory environment, JST said.

Grant is one of the latest in a string of crypto hires from the regulatory world, as the industry prepares for increased interest and oversight from government. At least 235 officials from Congress, the White House, federal agencies, the Federal Reserve and national political campaigns have moved to or from dozens of crypto companies, exchanges or trade associations, according to a February by the Tech Transparency Project, a watchdog group.

“Clients want to deal with trusted counterparties who understand the evolving regulatory landscape,” said Scott Freeman, co-founder and partner at JST.

JST, which has operations in the U.S. and Singapore, primarily trades its own capital, while also offering separate managed accounts for clients, according to its website. The company says it has tripled its clients since April 2021, and increased gross revenue by about 10-fold in 2021 compared to the previous year. It has also participated in seed funding rounds for companies including non-fungible token firm Recur and digital-asset platform InvestaX in the past 12 months.

Grant isn’t alone in making the switch to crypto this year. In January, Brandon Neal joined decentralized finance firm Euler XYZ as chief operating officer after more than nine years at the New York Fed. The same month, former Fed economist Gordon Liao became head of research for decentralized cryptocurrency exchange developer Uniswap Labs.

It’s broadly acknowledged that “crypto and digital assets are here to stay,” Grant said in emailed comments. “I look forward to working with JST’s clients.”