Coinbase Looks to Dissolve Political Action Committee (PAC), According to Recent Filing

Coinbase recently attempted to have a political action committee (PAC), which is often used for the raising of funds for either public office or business/ideological interests. Though coordination is forbidden with the efforts that a PAC supports, there have been some cases where this type of interaction has occurred.

Unfortunately, Coinbase has not seen a lot of success with the PAC and they have filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to request to close the project. The FEC is the regulatory agency that is presently in charge of enforcing laws regarding elections.

In the request, Coinbase expressed that the PAC ultimately received no funds during its lifetime and made no payouts. The policies with the FEC specifically state that the only way to stop the operation of a PAC is with a termination report when the company no longer plans to have incoming or outgoing activities, including contributions and costs.

At the time of Coinbase’s filing on April 3^rd, the PAC was only 10 months old.

The head of the PAC by Coinbase was Mike Lempres, who ended up leaving Coinbase in lieu of a position with Andreessen Horowitz. The most likely person to take over at the time was Brian Brooks, who ended up the chief legal officer with Coinbase in September. In the same month, Coinbase established itself as a founding member of the Blockchain Association, which represents the interests of the blockchain industry in Washington, DC.

A spokesperson from Coinbase has confirmed that the exchange filed the request to shut down but did not provide any details regarding if the FEC had approved the request. Until the FEC ends up accepting the termination report, a committee has to keep up with filing disclosure reports. According to the website on these committees, the information from their activities, no matter how small, must continue to be posted.