Gemini co‑founder Tyler Winklevoss said JPMorgan froze the crypto exchange’s effort to regain banking services after he accused “banksters” of trying to strangle fintech and crypto firms.
In a thread on July 25, Winklevoss claimed the bank told Gemini that his earlier tweet had prompted a pause in re‑onboarding, an effort underway since JPMorgan off‑boarded the company during what he calls “Operation Choke Point 2.0.”
He added:
“They want us to stay silent while they quietly try to take away your right to access your banking data for free […] We will continue to call out this anti‑competitive, rent‑seeking behavior.”
The cause
The July 19 post that he said “struck a nerve” accused large banks of fighting the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) open‑banking rule under Section 1033 of the Consumer Financial Protection Act.
That rule, still being implemented, would guarantee consumers free third-party access to their account data through aggregators such as Plaid.
Plaid is a conduit many Americans use to connect their checking accounts with crypto platforms, including Gemini, Coinbase, and Kraken.
Winklevoss alleged that JPMorgan and other institutions want to replace free data feeds with “exorbitant fees,” a shift he warned would “bankrupt fintechs” and stifle the on‑ramp that lets retail customers fund crypto purchases with dollars.
Strangling the crypto industry
He framed the banks’ lawsuit against the CFPB as an example of “egregious regulatory capture” and cast the fight as a direct challenge to President Donald Trump’s stated goal of making the US “the crypto capital of the world.”
JPMorgan has not publicly addressed Winklevoss’s allegations.
Several exchanges lost long-standing accounts in 2023 and early 2024 amid heightened regulatory scrutiny, forcing them to seek new partners or international workarounds.
Gemini, which previously used JPMorgan for corporate banking, has been courting new and former providers as it expands its international derivatives venue and bids for broader US offerings.
Some crypto voices, such as CoinMetrics co-founder Nic Carter, link these actions to a series of enforcement actions by banking authorities under the former President Joe Biden administration, known as Operation Chokepoint 2.0.
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) Acting Chairman Travis Hill acknowledged a targeted effort from the agency towards “debanking” crypto firms.
During a speech in January, he deemed such actions “unacceptable.”
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