FINRA Offers Job Opportunities to People Laid Off by Crypto Companies

The recent bearish trend of the crypto market has brought an unprecedented wave of unemployment in the crypto industry, causing financial regulators to step up and absorb as many of those out of work as possible.

On June 14, The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) of the United States announced plans to increase its resources “to understand and monitor cryptocurrencies,” therefore, it is willing to hire former crypto industry workers who have been laid off recently.

The news comes after a wave of massive layoffs by major cryptocurrency exchanges such as Crypto.com, Robinhood, Coinbase, Gemini, and BlockFi, which had to cut more than 20% of the company employees.

FINRA Wants to Hire Crypto Natives

According to FINRA’s CEO, the organization’s idea is to expand the number of employees trained in the cryptocurrency space due to the high demand for knowledgeable personnel.

Robert Cook, CEO of FINRA, said in a conference covered by Reuters that FINRA has to participate in the crypto space. The organization is already counting dozens of members that have managed to be approved to trade cryptocurrencies, so hiring crypto experts seems to be the next logical step.

“FINRA has several dozen members that have been approved to trade digital asset securities, as well as members who allow customers to access crypto products, and members with registered representatives who have outside business activities around crypto.”

In addition, he called on all those who have been laid off from a cryptocurrency platform to go work with them:

“We’re going to need to be engaged and prepared to have the resources to do that, so anybody who is getting laid off from a crypto platform and wants to work for FINRA, give me a call,”

Crypto Crash Dragged Some Companies Down

The crypto market crash has caused unexpected collapses in several of the most important and heavily invested projects in the ecosystem, causing many cryptocurrency platforms to face millions in losses.

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For example, Coinbase, one of the largest US cryptocurrency exchange platforms, announced by Email the layoff of almost a fifth of its employees (around 1,100 people), while Gemini, another cryptocurrency exchange, had to lay off 10% of its staff.

This layoff spree, “justified” by the CEOs of the affected exchanges, has not reached all platforms. Binance – which hired experts from FINRA in April— and Kraken continue hiring new staff for their companies. In a recent tweet early today, Binance CEO Chanpeng Zhao tried to distance himself from its competitors, implying that his crypto exchange had a better growth strategy than other platforms, emphasizing that Binance is actually hiring people in these hard times:

It was not easy saying no to Super bowl ads, stadium naming rights, large sponsor deals a few months ago, but we did.

Today, we are hiring for 2000 open positions for #Binance. pic.twitter.com/n24nrUik8O

— CZ 🔶 Binance (@cz_binance) June 15, 2022

So not all is lost; FINRA is not the only organization that has set its eyes on new jobs in the crypto industry.