The Bitfury Group announced that it has onboarded Brian P. Brooks as its new Chief Executive Officer, effective 29 October 2021.
In a press release shared with Finance Magnates, Brian P. Brooks, the former United States Acting Comptroller of the Currency, has been chosen by the Bitfury Group, a world-leading technology company unlocking the full value chain of Bitcoin and other digital assets, as its Chief Executive Officer.
Brooks will drive the crypto unicorn as it begins a new funding round. In addition, it is increasing the growth of its mining business with a revolutionary new microchip design and new global data center locations. Further, Bitfury is scaling a portfolio of innovative businesses that grew out of its heritage as an early Bitcoin leader.
Meanwhile, Valery Vavilov, the Founder of Bitfury, will reach the pinnacle position of Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Vision Officer. He will persevere focusing on the development of over-the-horizon hardware and software innovations as the company builds infrastructure for a tokenized global economy.
An Overview of Brooks’ Career
Before Bitfury recruited him, Brooks served Binance.US as its CEO for a short stint of four months this year.
Earlier on, he served the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency as Acting Comptroller of the Currency. For approximately nine months, he led 3,500 federal agency employees with a budget of $1.1 billion. Additionally, he fulfilled the role of First Deputy Comptroller of the Currency and Chief Operating Officer for only two months before being promoted.
Prior to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Brooks became a member of the Board of Directors at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation in May 2020.
Also, Fannie Mae benefitted again from his experience as he returned as a member of the Board of Directors for just over a year. His responsibilities included being a member of the Risk Policy & Capital Committee and the Strategic Initiatives & Technology Committee.
Moreover, he took on roles at three companies simultaneously all ending in March 2020. At Coinbase he was Chief Legal Officer. Here, he led legal, compliance, internal audit, government relations, and global investigations groups at the nation's leading digital asset platform. During the same time frame, he was the Founding Advisor at Spring Labs, which is a decentralized network for identity and credit. This is not forgetting his time at Avant, where he was a member of the Board of Directors and Chairman of the Compliance and Information Security Committee.
In late 2014, he joined the ranks of Fannie Mae as the Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary. For almost four years, he led the legal department and government & industry relations team of approximately 200 professionals for a Fortune 20 public company with assets of approximately $3.2 trillion.
In addition, OneWest Bank (now CIT Bank, N.A.) hired him as Vice Chairman from May 2011 to November 2014.
Further, O'Melveny & Myers LLP appointed him as its Managing Partner of the Washington, D.C. office, as well as Chairman of the Financial Services Practice Group for the bulk of his career.
Pioneering Innovative Blockchain Hardware and Software Infrastructure
Commenting on the announcement of Brooks appointment, Vavilov stated: “Since our founding, Bitfury has pioneered innovative blockchain hardware and software infrastructure, and today represents a comprehensive platform addressing and enhancing the full digital asset value chain. With an eye toward the next phase in our evolution, we are thrilled to welcome Brian to the Company. Brian is a respected executive and thought leader with deep regulatory, digital asset and capital markets expertise who shares Bitfury’s vision for a decentralized peer-to-peer economy. Together, we will continue to execute Bitfury’s growth strategy and help businesses, governments, organizations, and individuals Leverage the blockchain to solve the most pressing challenges of today and tomorrow.”
“Bitfury is an established leader in the digital asset industry, renowned for its sustained research and development efforts and best-in-class proprietary technologies. As the adoption of, and use cases for, Bitcoin, other cryptoassets, and their underlying blockchains continues to accelerate worldwide, the Company’s diversified portfolio has immense opportunity and is well-positioned for long-term success. I look forward to working alongside Valery and Bitfury’s highly experienced leadership team to grow the Company’s core businesses and scale its portfolio of new innovations,” Brooks said.
