00:00Lydia, thanks for speaking with us. How significant is this that the Trump administration is thinking of putting forward some Democratic nominees for this regulator?
00:10Well, it would be really significant. It could be the very first Democratic nominees at any independent agency in this administration.
00:17The SEC is also down to just three Republicans. There are no Democrats since the beginning of this year as well.
00:24But what we know is that the at least the CFTC seems to be the sort of initial priority for the White House in deciding whether to move forward with a bipartisan slate.
00:33And one reason perhaps that it might be a priority is the CFTC, even though traditionally it regulates the derivatives and swaps market, it's taken on a larger role.
00:43It's now contending with crypto and as well prediction markets where we've seen booming growth with Kaoshi and Polymarket picking up a lot of attention.
00:52Talk to us a little bit about the remit of the CFTC right now, given that it's so understaffed.
00:59You're right, Scarlett. The CFTC only has one commissioner. That's the new chairman, Michael Selig.
01:05And they are already very busy. Prediction markets have really taken over at that agency.
01:10And then with Congress debating whether to move forward with crypto market structure legislation, they could get even more authority to oversee the digital asset market.
01:19And in fact, this bipartisan slate that's under consideration plays into that because Democrats have asked for a quorum requirement at both these agencies to be put in place so that there would have to be members of minority party.
01:33Whoever's in charge in the future, there would always be minority members for any major agency actions, including rulemaking.
01:39And that would be very significant, you know, if if the bill passes, if these agencies do get more crypto authority.
01:46Yeah, you make a great point. The crypto market structure legislation is something that we're still awaiting.
01:51It didn't get through last year. Could it get done before a Democratic nominee is, you know, installed on the CFTC or would it likely be kind of happening at the same time?
02:01It's a good question. I think that that really comes down to, one, if the White House decides to move forward with bipartisan nominees at all.
02:09But, you know, we're expecting a markup in the Senate Banking Committee on their version of that bill next week.
02:15In fact, a week from today. You know, what happens after that, if that markup's even going to be successful and get the bill out of committee?
02:22We don't know yet. We'll see. But typically these nominees do take many months to come through sort of the whole confirmation process once they're even out from the White House.
02:31So, you know, it's hard to say where whether those two tracks will align at all.
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