More than 80 managers of leading crypto and fintech companies, including Gemini, Andreessen Horowitz, Paradigm and Kraken, have called on US President Donald Trump to block new banking costs for access to the consumer’s financial data.
In a letter of 14 August, the group argued that these charges, which will come into force in September, directly threaten innovation and consumer choice.
They said that the reimbursements make it harder for Americans to connect their bank accounts with preferred financing, which undermines the recent progress in financial technology policy.
The signatories accused the largest banks of the country of deliberately limiting access to essential financial services.
According to them, this step would consolidate control in the hands of some institutions, limiting competition and limiting the progress in three strategic sectors, including cryptocurrency, artificial intelligence and digital portfolios.
They added:
“This is not a dispute about fair prices; it is an anti-competitive move that is designed to consolidate power. It is in danger of paralyzing innovative products and can lead to small businesses and financial tools.”
The industry warns against broader consequences
Kraken Co-CEO Arjun Sethi said that he signed the letter from financial freedom because the deployment reached far beyond Fintech.
He called the proposed reimbursements ‘technically backwards, economically short -sighted and strategically dangerous’, warning that they threaten the basis of programmable money and open finances.
According to him, the proposed reimbursements could turn the most dynamic financial technological sector in the world into a walled garden that is run by a few institutions.
He added:
“If we want to lead in programmable money, assets from the real world, stablecoins and self -needed financing, then we must defend the basic principle that access to consumer data should be easy, safe and free.”
Telini CEO Tyler Winklevoss also repeated this vision and emphasized that consumers must have unlimited access to their funds and data.
Winklevoss said:
“Banks may not entail your funds and data and make it difficult for you to gain access to your data or to move your capital to where you want. That is your human right and fundamental to the proper functioning of the capitalism on which our country has been established.”