NYC Mayor Receives First Paycheck in Converted Bitcoin and Ethereum

By Casey Wagner/January 20, 2022, 12:22 pm EST

New York City Mayor Eric Adams made good on his promise to receive his first paychecks in cryptocurrency, the Office of the Mayor said Thursday.

Adams’ first paycheck, which arrives Friday, will be converted into bitcoin and ether through Coinbase before the funds are made available, according to the statement.

“New York is the center of the world, and we want it to be the center of cryptocurrency and other financial innovations,” Adams said in the statement.

“Being on the forefront of such innovation will help us create jobs, improve our economy, and continue to be a magnet for talent from all over the globe.”

Adams had originally said via Twitter that he would receive his first three paychecks in bitcoin exclusively. Thursday’s statement clarifies that some of his compensation will also be delivered in ether, but the breakdown between the two was not disclosed.

Creating a crypto-friendly city has been a central part of Adams’ platform. In November, he approved the launch of the NYCCoin, a token created by the CityCoin project. NYCCoin, currently available to trade on OKCoin, is mined by forwarding the Stacks token, $STX, to the NYCCoin smart contract. When tokens are successfully mined, a percentage of $STX forwarded by miners to the Stacks protocol goes into a wallet reserved for NYC.

Coinbase’s paycheck feature was unveiled in September. The exchange now allows users to have paychecks directly deposited into their exchange accounts.

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