BGR Group is bringing back Matt Hoffmann three years after he left the lobbying giant to become the Republican staff director for the House Financial Services Committee.
As a principal and the new co-head of the firm’s financial services practice group, Hoffmann will focus on cryptocurrency and digital assets regulation, banking, capital markets and the next iteration of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Investment Act (TCJA), a top priority for Republicans with several provisions set to expire in 2026.
BGR Group Chairman and CEO Bob Wood called Hoffmann — also a former policy director at the Senate Finance Committee and senior adviser to former Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) on the House Budget and Ways and Means Committees — “a tremendous asset to our firm and our clients as we navigate upcoming tax and financial services policy debates.”
During his time as chief adviser to House Financial Services Committee Chair Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), one of the many things Hoffmann said he was “lucky” to have worked on was the Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act (FIT21), the first comprehensive cryptocurrency bill to pass the chamber earlier this year.
“I think that the the environment for productive, substantive policy development, bringing traditional finance and the crypto industry closer together,” Hoffmann told The Hill. “Now is the time for that work.”
Crypto has been on a tear since Trump won and began appointing industry-friendly regulators to key positions in the incoming administration. Bitcoin broke $100,000 for the first time this week after the president-elect announced his pick to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
When asked about the possibility of comprehensive crypto legislation being signed into law over the next two years, Hoffmann described himself as an “eternal optimist.”
“I am optimistic that we’re gonna get something over the finish line,” he said.
When Hoffmann briefly joined the blockchain technology company Digital Asset this summer as director of regulatory and government affairs, McHenry praised him for helping “Committee Republicans achieve our objectives while maintaining the bipartisanship necessary to secure lasting results.”
McHenry is retiring at the end of this Congress, but Hoffmann didn’t seem worried about the upcoming leadership transition on the committee.
“The senior leadership on that committee is exceptional. They have been involved in the space for a very long time and all of them were intimately involved in not just the crypto legislation, but our national security stuff, our banking regulations, the banking work that we did,” he said.
