Growing speculation that former U.S. President Donald Trump will soon nominate Paul Atkins to become the next chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) saw the Reserve Rights (RSR) token surge by over 88 percent Wednesday to a multiyear high.
Atkins’ past association with the Reserve Rights Foundation, which is behind the token, is the reason given for spike in RSR’s value. Atkins’ previous involvement with the project has already captured the attention of the cryptocurrency community, who are now rumored to be seeking his appointment to the security and exchange commission.
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Atkins was involved with the project early on, Reserve CEO and Reserve co-creator Nevin Freeman confirmed, but has not been active in providing consultancy lately. “It was advisory Atkins was at the beginning of the project,” Freeman wrote in an Nov. 28 post on X (formerly Twitter). “Even the crypto itself was open minded and willing to lean into crypto, which was impressive.” I would love to work with him again.”
Former SEC commissioner Atkins has proven popular in the crypto community for his willingness to work with crypto clients. In addition, he runs a consultancy founded in 2017 which has hosted clients that included crypto firms. They are now seen as a positive development by key figures in the cryptocurrency space, including pro crypto attorney John Deaton, who vocally praised the appointment of Atkins on social media.
After the announcement that Gary Gensler, the big man in the SEC’s corner office, is leaving, the SEC’s future direction remains in limbo. Fox News had reported that Trump’s top pick for the role could be named as early as Friday, the following day.
At the same time that rumors of Atkins’ nomination reached their height, RSR shot up from around $0.005 to about $0.017 on Dec. 3. Although the RSR coin has racked up a recent rally, it is still far below its all time high of $0.11 in April 2021.
