California moves to embrace cryptocurrency and regulate it

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California, which would have the world's fifth-largest economy if it was a country, on Wednesday became the first U.S. state to formally begin examining how to broadly adapt to cryptocurrency and related innovations, following a path laid out by President Joe Biden in March.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order for state agencies to move in tandem with the federal government to craft regulations for digital currencies. It also calls for officials to explore incorporating broader blockchain computer coding into the government operations of the state where much of the world's technological innovation is born.

Evolving blockchain and cryptocurrency technology “is potentially an explosive creator of new companies and new jobs and new opportunities,” said Dee Dee Myers, a senior advisor to Newsom and director of the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development.

“So there are a lot of opportunities,” she said. “There’s also a lot of unknowns in the industry and so that’s another reason we want to engage early.”

Newsom’s order says the state — home to Silicon Valley and financial innovators like PayPal and Square — should be out front in figuring out how to adapt to new technologies.

“Too often government lags behind technological advancements, so we’re getting ahead of the curve on this, laying the foundation to allow for consumers and business to thrive,” Newsom, a Democrat, said in a statement.

California has about 39 million residents and its economy is more than $3.1 trillion, larger on its own as a U.S. state than the United Kingdom and India. Newsom said his order is a step toward making it the nation's first state “to establish a comprehensive, thoughtful, and harmonized regulatory and business environment for crypto...