XRP and Bitcoin trending topics on ‘60 minutes’

On Sundays, the average American in a red (Republican) state tends to sit in front of his television and watch American Football (aka the NFL). This has been the case for years and it is unlikely this will ever change. On the east and west coast, however, in the more Democratic cities like New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles, people usually watch ’60 minutes’ on Sundays, a current affairs program.

With an average of 10 million American (middle class) households tuning in, Ripple Labs CEO Brad Garlinghouse spoke for a very large audience last Sunday to explain what XRP, Ripple Labs and Bitcoin stand for.

https://twitter.com/RippleXrpie/status/1865919662510260735

17 million Americans own crypto via a platform or a crypto wallet. Many more than that have invested in the various Bitcoin ETFs. The program was widely viewed and commented online.

PAC

While the Democrats are still trying to figure out what the hell happened (they lost control of Congress, the Senate and the White House) and Kamala Harris seems to have disappeared from the face of the earth (she is on holiday in Hawaii), the American media is keen to explain why Donald Trump and the Republicans won so many votes.

60 Minutes found part of the solution. According to them, one of the reasons is the large amount of money that the crypto industry gave to Republican candidates through PACs (political action committees).

Several hundreds of millions of dollars were donated via Coinbase, Robinhood, Riot Platforms. Marathon Digital, Cleanspark and many other crypto companies.

They're using 60 Minutes to discredit crypto, but #XRP is in a league of its own. Banks have already integrated it into their systems, its use case is rock-solid, and this is just soft disclosure of a larger plan. Stay #BullishOnXRP pic.twitter.com/eBbP6huRx4

— Black Swan Capitalist (@VersanAljarrah) December 9, 2024

Ripple Labs itself donated some $140 million to several candidates it believed would push through crypto regulations during the next administration.

All that money apparently went to good use because 85% of candidates who received money from the crypto industry in the United States won their respective races against Democratic candidates.

Garlinghouse furthermore explained in his interview with 60 Minutes that the digital currency industry is now hoping for a clear set of rules in which this new industry will be able to operate (with a higher price for XRP, of course). According to crypto fans on social media, the good news was that crypto ended up on ’60 minutes’, the bad news was that ’60 minutes’ reported rather negatively on digital coins.

However, as the ‘Wolf of Wall Street’ teaches us: there is no such thing as bad publicity.