Kristin Smith, the executive director of the Blockchain Association, a leading lobbying group for the cryptography policy in Washington, will leave next month to take a role as president of the new Solana Policy Institute, according to a Tuesday’s announcement.
“I am incredibly proud of what we have achieved together and sure that the future of the organization is brilliant,” said Smith in a statement.
Earlier this week, Miller Whitehouse-Levine founded the organization and announced its position as CEO shortly after giving up the Defi Education Fund.
Although the group has not yet clarified its source of financing, its website said it will focus its message on “how decentralized networks like Solana are the future of the digital economy.”
Smith has led the Blockchain association for almost seven years, a dramatic period for developing industry. Since the end of last year, political lands have solidified under the feet of the sector, since allies that execute all levels of the United States government, where cryptographic defenders have been trying to obtain an integral set of regulations.
The Blockchain association has been a central player in the lobbying of the industry.
The organization said its Board is now carrying out a search to replace Smith.
Whitehouse-Levin once worked on the political operations of that organization.
“The innovators deserve to have the clarity they need to build a global Economy without friction based on the Internet, a future that we believe can be achieved with correct laws, rules and frames,” he said in a statement during the launch of this week of the Solana group.
Update (April 1, 2025, 19:09 UTC): Add Kristin Smith comment.
