Andrew Cuomo faces blowback as he plugs NYSE owners Chinese joint venture for crypto-based stock exchanges

Former Gov.Andrew Cuomo has landed in the middle of a crypto fracas as he backs tokenized stock exchanges – a new crypto-based trading model that has incited blowback from major companies that don’t want their shares traded with crypto.Tokenized shares ties a digital token to a traditional stock so the token’s price mimics the shares of a publicly listed company.

Crypto junkies have argued it’s the future of finance, allowing investors to trade 24/7. In June, Cuomo was named the co-chairman of OKXICE – a 50-50 joint venture between China-based crypto exchange OKX and the Intercontinental Exchange, which owns the New York Stock Exchange. But the tokenized exchange Cuomo is touting is already facing blowback from a range of businesses.Cerebras Systems, AppLovin, Applied Digital, Rocket Lab, CoreWeave, Verizon, Applied Optoelectronics, Broadcom and UnitedHealth all recently objected to being included on OKXICE, the new tokenized exchange.After resigning as governor amid a slew of harassment allegations which he has denied, Cuomo left the governor’s mansion in 2021.He then worked as a consultant for several unidentified companies, earning nearly $5 million in 2024, according to his tax returns. He worked as a paid advisor for OKX starting in 2023, according to the company.

Last month, Cuomo bought a $9.6 million estate in the Hamptons. “Everyone’s talking about ‘tokenize this, tokenize that, tokenizing securities,’” Cuomo – who suffered a brutal defeat to NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani last year – told the Wall Street Journal earlier this month.“If you could sell American equities 24/7 globally, wow, that is really a transformational game-changer.That can bring billions into the American economy,” he said.In 2025, OKX agreed to pay more than half a billion dollars and pleaded guilty to violating anti-money laundering laws following an FBI investigation. Representatives for the SEC, Intercontinental Exchange and Cuomo did not immediately r...