Lobbying. It’s a pretty big thing on Capitol Hill.
And with the tremendous growth of bitcoin over the past year, you can bet that the digital currency (and perhaps digital currency as a whole) has started to become a talking point for lobbyists.
Take lobbying firm Peck Madigan Jones, for example.
In an LD-2 Disclosure Form (which is a lobbying report, see the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995), which clearly states the firm is working for MasterCard, the company listed bitcoin as one of the many issues they’re working on in the nation’s capital:
[blockquote style=”2″]Specific Lobbying Issues: Interchange fees, gift cards, overdraft fees, data breach, identity theft, Bitcoin and mobile payments. Implementation of Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Pub.L. 111-203), including debit interchange fee amendment. Mobile payments in general. Court decision regarding Federal Reserve’s interchange rule. S. 1193, Data Security and Breach Notification Act of 2013. S. 1897, Personal Data Privacy and Security Act of 2014. S. 1927, Data Security Act of 2014. S. 1976, Data Security and Breach Notification Act of 2014. S. 1995, Personal Data Protection and Breach Accountability Act of 2014. [/blockquote]
The firm doesn’t specifically disclose what their lobbying with relation to bitcoin involves, but they are working for MasterCard.
The multinational financial services company is a massive payments processor, whose product many would agree directly competes with bitcoin.
And since lobbyists influence (often times very controversially) how legislation is passed, this could either be a very positive or negative thing for bitcoin in the long run.
Still, it’s interesting to see that bitcoin has reached a level of popularity in which it’s being discussed with some of the most powerful lawmakers in the United States.
But will anything good come from it?