US President-elect Donald Trump wants to appoint venture capitalist David Sachs as the government’s representative on artificial intelligence and cryptocurrencies. Both topics are “vital to America’s future competitiveness,” Trump said via his online mouthpiece Truth Social. Sachs, a confidant of tech billionaire Elon Musk, has the task of making the United States the clear world market leader in AI and digital currency business.
Advertisement
First decision: TikTok banned in America?
Trump wrote that, as a government representative, Sachs would “protect freedom of expression online and move us away from the bias and censorship of big tech companies.” He should also create a legal framework for the crypto industry “so it can get the clarity it wants and thrive in the US.” Accordingly, Sachs will also head the incoming President’s advisory committee responsible for science and technology.
Bitcoin investors are in party mood after Trump’s election victory
Since Trump’s election victory on November 5, Bitcoin has seen a massive rise as investors are anticipating crypto-friendly regulation of the industry. While the oldest and best-known digital currency was still trading at around $70,000 before the election, it temporarily broke the $100,000 threshold for the first time on Thursday night. The party mood in the crypto scene was earlier heightened by Trump’s announcement that he would install digital currency advocate Paul Atkins as the head of the powerful US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
“David Sachs was a highly successful entrepreneur and investor for 25 years, building and funding some of Silicon Valley’s biggest icon companies,” Trump wrote. In the early days of PayPal, the now world-famous American payment services provider, Sachs was the chief executive officer. He later founded the software company Yammer – which created a kind of in-house Facebook program for companies – and sold it to industry giant Microsoft for $1.2 billion in 2012. Recently he also co-hosted a tech podcast.
(axk)
New EU directive: Creators of software and AI will soon be liable for their products
