Tether (USDT) paid more than $6 million to a consulting firm co-owned by Bo Hines while he pushed a stablecoin law as Donald Trump's crypto adviser, a new investigation found.
Key Points:
- Nxum struck its Tether deal in May 2025, while Hines still advised the White House on crypto.
- Hines relayed legislative updates to his partners through a Signal group chat, the report says.
- A Nxum representative said Hines had no role in the Tether business while in government.
Tether Nxum Payments
Hines co-founded Nxum with his father, Todd Hines, and marketing executive Gary Dennis, and the firm struck its Tether deal in May 2025, a newspaper investigation revealed Wednesday.
The first payment landed while Hines was still working to finalize the GENIUS Act, and Nxum has since collected a reported $6.3 million from the arrangement. The money was split among the firm's three partners.
Hines, who kept a one-third stake, stepped back from daily operations but stayed in his partners' Signal group chat while serving, relaying legislative updates as they dealt with Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino.
He also pushed lawmakers to double the bill's compliance window to three years, according to people involved in the talks. That change chiefly benefited Tether. "Bo got it done," Dennis told an associate after Trump cut a deal with Republican holdouts in the House.
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Hines Ethics Questions
A Nxum representative said Hines neither knew about nor worked on the Tether business while serving, took no Tether-linked money then and held only a passive investment. Tether did not respond to requests for comment.
Cynthia Brown, a senior ethics counsel at the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said federal law generally bars officials from working on matters in which they hold a financial stake. The report lands as Tether, the world's largest stablecoin issuer, builds out its U.S. business, which Hines now runs, under the law he helped push through Congress. A top Senate Democrat is already probing Tether's ties to Cantor Fitzgerald.
Hines Nxum Ties
Hines announced his White House exit on Aug. 9, 2025, and Tether hired him as a strategic adviser 10 days later before naming him CEO of its new U.S. unit in September.
In April, a Tether-linked super PAC called Fellowship disclosed that its first expenditure, $300,000 in ads backing Georgia Republican Clay Fuller, went to Nxum. Jesse Spiro, a Tether U.S. executive, became the PAC's chairman on Apr. 1, though Tether International said it has no affiliation with the group. Federal campaign rules allow such payments as long as the services are genuine.
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