George Osborne has added another job title to his resume.
Since leaving the Tory front bench in 2016, Osborne has served as the editor of the Evening Standard, an advisor to BlackRock Inc (NYSE:BLK) and chair of the British Museum, in between numerous think tank and university fellowships.
Now, he will lend his talents to Coinbase Global Inc (NASDAQ:COIN), the Nasdaq-listed cryptocurrency exchange and the second-largest globally by trading volumes.
"There's a huge amount of exciting innovation in finance right now. Blockchains are transforming financial markets and online transactions. Coinbase is at the frontier of these developments," Osborne said on his appointment.
Coinbase will be “relying on his insights and experiences as we grow Coinbase around the world”, said the exchange’s chief policy officer Faryar Shirzad.
Without a legal or regulatory background, it is unclear how Osborne intends to help Coinbase in its ongoing legal challenges with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, which has accused the company of acting as an unregistered national securities exchange, broker, and clearing agency.
The SEC has also charged Coinbase for failing to register the offer and sale of its crypto asset staking-as-a-service program.
While Osborne’s appointment might sound like an odd fit, he’s not the first Tory, or even the first Tory chancellor, to follow the cabinet-to-crypto pipeline.
Hammond heads to Copper
Philip Hammond, who succeeded Osborne as chancellor in 2016, joined Copper Technologies, a London-based crypto custody and trading platform, in October 2021.
Initially as a senior adviser, Hammond was later appointed as the chair of the company in early 2023.
Hammond’s political ties came in handy when he facilitated a meeting with Treasury officials to discuss Copper’s regulatory troubles with the Financial Conduct Authority.
The Financial Times reported that Copper was seeking “public assurances that crypto/blockchain businesses are welcome in the UK”.
Copper has since registered in Switzerland, with Hammond blaming the slow regulatory process for the company’s move offshore.
Clegg’s metaverse pivot
Former coalition compatriot Nick Clegg famously joined social media-sum-metaverse group Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:META, ETR:FB2A, SWX:FB) (formerly Facebook) as president of global affairs in 2018.
Clegg resigned as leader of the Liberal Democrats after the ill-fated coalition with the Tories and a bruising 2015 election rout he deemed "immeasurably more crushing and unkind than he feared".
Today, he focuses his efforts on promoting the virtues of Meta’s virtual reality technology.
“The impact of the metaverse is real & it’s happening right now,” he recently Tweeted. “European companies are already using VR and AR to develop products, train employees and support medical professionals, educators, and students. As these technologies mature, so will their ability to break down socio-economic barriers, and create even more opportunities for businesses in Europe and beyond.”
Cameron keeps it conventional
Former Prime Minister David Cameron went down a more conventional post-premiership path by becoming an advisor to Greensill Capital, the now-collapsed traditional finance firm.
Traditional finance or not, the appointment was intensely scrutinised,
In 2021, then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson opened an inquiry into Cameron’s lobbying efforts while at Greensill.
The most egregious of allegations was Cameron’s attempts to persuade then-chancellor Rishi Sunak to secure preferable access to hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of emergency Covid loans for Greensill.
Cameron reportedly made £3.29 million after selling shares in the company.
Speaking of now-Prime Minister Sunak, could he be next to follow the cabinet-to-crypto pipeline?
Perhaps we’ll find out soon: Bets on a Tory wipeout in the next election, so he could be compiling a CV as we speak.