Coinbase is losing another important figure from its team. Mike Lempres, the Chief Policy Officer at Coinbase, took the decision to leave Coinbase and join the venture capital firm, Andreessen Horowitz. The information was released by Bloomberg a few days ago.
Mike Lempres Leaves Coinbase For New Role At Andreessen Horowitz
Coinbase is losing a valuable team member that took the decision to join the VC firm, Andreessen Horowitz. Michael Lempres was named the firm’s policy officer back in September. Before holding this position, he worked as a legal chief for the company for more than a year.
The departure of the policy head at Coinbase comes at a time in which regulatory agencies are tightening the grip in the cryptocurrency market. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has recently announced enforcement actions against two Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) in the market. In the future, new regulations could be embraced all over the world.
In an email that Coinbase wrote to Bloomberg News, they informed:
“As chief legal and risk officer during a time of tremendous growth of Coinbase, Mike was instrumental in building the company’s legal and compliance functions and driving our vision of trust through compliance. We wish him the best in his new position with Andreessen Horowitz.”
Apparently, Lempres moved to his policy role when Coinbase hired Brian Brooks as a head to the legal department. As Bloomberg reports, Lempres took the decision to leave the company when Coinbase brought on Mr. Brooks since he took over most of the responsibilities Lempres had.
Andreessen Horowitz was an earlier investor in Coinbase. Coinbase is currently one of the largest and most popular virtual currency-related companies in the market. However, this is not the first time that the company experiences such a situation with one of the team members.
Adam White, the fifth-ever employee at Coinbase and senior executive, left the company back in October. During his time working at the company, he had been vice president and general manager of Coinbase Institutional.
Moreover, the former head of trading, Hunter Merghart, took the decision to leave the company just six months after getting his job.
At the end of the last year and the beginning of 2018, several experts in traditional companies took the decision to migrate to the crypto industry. The virtual currency market was in its best moment and there was a lot of hype around it.
Carlos is an international relations’ analyst specializing in cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. Since 2017, Carlos has written extensively for UseTheBitcoin and other leading cryptocurrency sites; with over 2,000 articles published.
