• The advocacy group Crypto Market Integrity Coalition (CMIC) has incorporated 13 new members, among them Gemini, Chainalysis, and Robinhood.
• The organization’s mission is to acknowledge and mitigate market manipulation and fraud in the cryptocurrency industry.

One of crypto’s advocacy groups, the Crypto Market Integrity Coalition (CMIC) has welcomed 13 new signatories to its cause. Among them are the Winklevoss-led Gemini exchange, Robinhood Markets, and crypto intelligence firm Chainalysis. Others are blockchain analytics firm Elliptic, blockchain data firm Kaiko, Nexo lending platform, and crypto compliance firm TRM Labs.

Founded in February, the organization consisted of a cocktail of crypto exchanges, firms, and industry associations from around the world. The list includes prominent industry players Coinbase, BitMEX, Huobi Tech, Anchorage Digital, the Chamber of Digital Commerce, and CryptoUK.

Crypto Advocacy Group CMIC welcomes new members

CMIC was convened by market surveillance firm Solidus Labs. Its pledge, endorsed by member executives, is to crack down on crypto market manipulation in an effort to revive trust in the industry. Part of this objective reads:

We will integrate principles that uphold Market Integrity and Market Efficiency into our operations and business strategy.

In an introductory statement, Kathy Kraninger, Solidus Labs vice president of regulatory affairs said,

To enable the promise of crypto and DeFi, we must as an industry be vocal about our commitment to address and mitigate the risks.

Notably, membership in CMIC is open to all industry participants. Other than uniting various crypto groups, the coalition also plans to introduce industry-related training programs. Moreover, the group intends to engage in dialogue with regulators on how to positively oversee the industry.

Another one of the coalition’s plans is to “consider data-sharing and shared-surveillance frameworks” among members. 

Nexo, one of the inductees said the coalition’s mission “stands […] alongside our longstanding track record for proactive conversations with regulators globally, stringent platform security procedures, and extensive commitment to KYC and AML processes.”

Championing cryptocurrency

The crypto community has broken its quiet following high criticism, misinformation, and disparate regulatory opinions. Members are now finding ways to have sit-downs with lawmakers and other influential persons to encourage laws that embrace the industry. Among them are Bitfury CEO Brian Brooks, Paxos CEO Chad Cascarilla, and FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried. The latter has been in two congressional meetings since December last year.

Additional crypto advocacy groups have also emerged. An example is GoodFi, which was launched in 2021 by Radix. GoodFi mainly centers around decentralized finance (DeFi), specifically on education, research, and best practices. Currently, it boasts 55 member organizations. By 2025, the group looks to have 100 million people put at least a dollar in DeFi.

The Crypto Open Patent Alliance is another advocacy group launched in 2020 by Block (then Square). Block is headed by ex-Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, a prominent Bitcoin proponent. The alliance focuses on industry patents with “a shared patent library to help the crypto community defend against patent aggressors and trolls.”