Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo joins OKX crypto exchange board

By Anand Sinha Mon, July 20, 2026 at 11:06 AM PDT | 2 min read

Andrew Cuomo, the 56th governor of New York who served from 2011 until his resignation in 2021 following numerous sexual misconduct allegations, is making a dramatic career move. Cuomo has consistently denied the allegations, and investigations by five separate district attorneys into the five-year-old accusations resulted in no charges being brought forward.

Last year, Cuomo attempted a political comeback by running for mayor of New York City but lost to Zohran Mamdani.

Now, Cuomo has joined the board of directors of OKX, a cryptocurrency trading exchange.

Announcement and Rationale

OKX founder and CEO Star Xu shared the announcement on X on July 20, stating that Cuomo has been a trusted advisor to the exchange since 2023. Xu described Cuomo's deep leadership experience as an important step in the firm's goal to build the "world's most trustworthy large digital asset exchange."

"Governor Cuomo has been a thoughtful voice for OKX for years, and his move to the board formalizes a relationship that has already shaped how we approach the US market," Xu added. "As we build OKX into the infrastructure layer for both traditional and digital finance, we need people who understand how governments, institutions and markets actually think. That's exactly what he brings."

Joint Venture with ICE

On June 22, OKX and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), announced the formation of a joint venture focused on building next-generation infrastructure for tokenized and digitally native financial products. The venture will be co-chaired by ICE and Cuomo.

"This partnership brings together OKX's world-class blockchain technology and ICE's trusted market infrastructure to help build a more modern, transparent, and resilient financial system for the future," Cuomo remarked. "I am personally excited by the prospect of the societal impact that blockchain technology can lead to: the democratization of finance, bringing basic financial services to underserved populations."

Cuomo's Previous Role with OKX

According to a Bloomberg report from April 2025, OKX hired Cuomo to counsel the exchange during a federal probe.

In February 2025, OKX's parent company, Aux Cayes Fintech Co. Ltd., pleaded guilty to one count of operating an unlicensed money transmitting business and agreed to pay monetary penalties totaling more than $504 million.

During the mayoral campaign last year, Mamdani sharply criticized Cuomo for advising OKX while U.S. authorities were investigating the exchange.

Related: New York ban threatens Bitcoin miners' new revenue stream

This story was originally published by TheStreet on Jul 20, 2026, where it first appeared in the Policy section. Add TheStreet as a Preferred Source by clicking here.