Author: BitpushNews

On November 19th local time, Trump nominated billionaire investor and veteran Wall Street financier Howard Lutnick as the next Secretary of Commerce.

"I am pleased to announce that Howard Lutnick, Chairman and CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, will join my administration as United States Secretary of Commerce," Trump said in a statement. "He will lead our tariff and trade agenda and have direct responsibility for the Office of the United States Trade Representative."

If confirmed by the Senate, Lutnick will be responsible for expanding U.S. economic growth and promoting domestic industry, helping to maintain and expand government-business relations. The Commerce Department and other agencies will play a central role in implementing the president-elect's proposal to impose tariffs on U.S. imports.

Lutnick, 63, co-chairman of Trump's transition team, is perhaps the most legendary member of Trump's inner circle, having led his company from the ashes of 9/11.

Wall Street's "tragic" spokesperson: lost his parents at a young age, and his company was almost "wiped out" in 911

Lutnick was born into a family with a strong artistic atmosphere. However, his mother died of lymphoma when he was in his senior year of high school. Just one week after the start of his freshman year, his father unfortunately died in a medical accident. The 18-year-old Lutnick was forced to hire a lawyer to settle the debts left by his father. He depended on his sister and brother for life and completed college with a full scholarship.

Wall Street, a financial arena full of opportunities and challenges, became the stage for Lutnick to start his second life. As a rookie, he was quickly appreciated by the boss of Cantor Fitzgerald and was entrusted with important tasks and promoted successively, becoming the best candidate for successor. At the age of 30, he was appointed president and CEO of the company.

However, fate's trick was not over yet.

On September 11, 2001, when Lutnick was about to send his son to kindergarten and take a precious photo, tragic news came: terrorists flew planes into the twin towers where the company was located, and the lives of his brother Gary Lutnick and two-thirds of the employees (658 people) came to an abrupt end.

Before the attack, Cantor had nearly a quarter of the market share in the U.S. Treasury market. Lutnick vowed to revive the company. With the help of the London office, Cantor rebuilt its electronic infrastructure and resumed trading within a week with the remaining manpower.

Lutnick once recalled in an NPR interview that on the night of 9/11, he told his remaining employees: "If we're going to work, we're going to take care of our friends' families. We went from a big company making a million dollars a day to a company losing a million dollars a day."

A week after the incident, Lutnick founded the nonprofit Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund and pledged to distribute 25% of the firm’s profits over the next five years to pay for ten years of health care for the families of its 658 former Cantor Fitzgerald, eSpeed ​​and TradeSpark employees (these profits would have otherwise been distributed to Cantor Fitzgerald partners).

The fund was initially started with a $1 million donation from Lutnick himself, and to date, it has donated about $180 million to employee families, for a total of about $280 million, according to the New York Times.

Lutnick and Cantor became one of Wall Street’s most inspiring stories. Trump mentioned his brother’s death in his Commerce Department nomination — calling Lutnick “the embodiment of resilience in the face of unspeakable grief.”

BTC Fans + Tether Partners

Lutnick is a vocal supporter of the crypto industry. He once said in an interview with CNBC: "I am a fan of cryptocurrency, but let me be more specific: Bitcoin is Bitcoin."

In 2020, when the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency issued new regulations on digital asset custody and clearing, Lutnick keenly sensed the business opportunities therein. He quickly met with Tether’s Chief Financial Officer Giancarlo Devasini to lay out the company’s development in the digital asset field.

Since 2021, Cantor has helped Tether manage the large inventory of U.S. Treasuries that back its USDT stablecoin.

“I knew nothing about digital assets at the time, and I was looking for opportunities to meet all the important people,” he said at the Bitcoin conference.

Lutnick said: "Bitcoin, like gold, should be freely traded around the world, and as the world's largest steward, we will do everything we can to make this happen. Bitcoin should be traded around the world like gold, without exceptions and without restrictions."

Supported by Musk

Musk and other Trump insiders last week called on Trump to abandon his previous Treasury Secretary nominee Scott Bessent in favor of Lutnick. Musk said in a post, "Bessent is a conventional choice, while Lutnick will truly drive change."

The Treasury secretary position has been the focus of a fierce competition within Trump's team. At the same time, the position is also closely watched by the financial community because an unexpected nominee could have an immediate negative impact on the stock market. Trump has not yet made a decision on several remaining key positions in his proposed cabinet.

The remaining leading candidates for the position are Bessant, former Federal Reserve Board Governor Kevin Warsh, Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan and Tennessee Sen. Bill Hagerty.

A staunch supporter of Trump's tariff plan

Lutnick has previously donated to politicians from both parties, including Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign, according to OpenSecrets.org. But in recent years he has become a major Republican donor, giving millions to Trump's campaign and hosting a $15 million fundraiser at his home in the Hamptons this summer.

Trump proposed during his campaign a 60% tariff on Chinese goods and tariffs of up to 20% on everything else imported into the U.S. He portrayed the import taxes as a negotiating tool to strike better trade terms but also as a way to generate revenue to finance tax cuts elsewhere.

As an advocate of tariffs, Lutnick expressed full support for Trump's tariff plan in an interview with CNBC in September. He said: "Tariffs are a great tool that the president can use - we need to protect American workers."

At a Madison Square Garden rally last month, Lutnick described his vision for transforming the U.S. economy by returning to the "boom days" of 1900. "When was America ever really great?" he told the crowd. "At the turn of the century, when our economy was booming, we had no income tax, we had tariffs."