- Former Kraken legal head shifts to Pantera Capital to lead regulated crypto investments.
- Santori helped shape crypto regulation, including SAFT and SEC responses.
- Santori highlights the ongoing regulatory work and seeks new projects for Pantera Capital.
Marco Santori, former chief legal officer of cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, has been recruited as a general partner for California-based VC shop Pantera Capital, one of the top firms active in investing in cryptocurrencies today. This move comes as investors increasingly show interest in cryptocurrency initial public offerings (IPOs) and token deals.
Former Kraken Legal Head Joins Pantera Capital
In addition to helping imagine Simple Agreement for Future Tokens (Like, regularly known as SAFT), the device can be used to sell tokens to traders before an actual launch. Santori is known for helping us imagine additional approaches to use this different generation of smart contracts. For more than three years, he was a member of Kraken’s about 70 lawyers and was involved in how Kraken responded to two enforcement actions from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, Santori said. In addition, he has been Blockchain.com’s chief legal officer.
Santori Reflects on 12 Years of Progress
Then Santori reflected on his 12 years of travel, saying, ‘For 12 years I’ve been with you all, building this regulatory environment that crypto has today.’ We now have allies in Congress, and we’ve made time in that body to remove the most vicious of its detractors, maybe even one who was pro-crypto in the White House. Harris said, ‘We are clearly in a new era,’ but the work is not yet done.
Although Santori will remain a senior adviser to Kraken, his new job with Pantera Capital, which manages well over $5 billion in assets, will focus on companies that work in the space of regulated enterprises. He tells Santori he is looking for new projects that can deploy the regulatory envelope further before the paradigm collapses to the ground and does not break it in the early crypto era.
