Representatives in the US House of Representatives have asked cryptocurrency firms for data on diversity and inclusion.

Data on the inclusion and diversity practices of up to 20 notable companies related to Web3 and cryptocurrencies was requested by a team of 5 policymakers from the United States House of Representatives.

The United States government has asked crypto companies to disclose their diversity and inclusion statistics.

Maxine Waters, chair of the House Financial Services Committee, and Representatives Stephen Lynch, Bill Foster, Al Green, and Joyce Beatty signed a letter on Thursday asking U.S.-based crypto venues to detail whether or not they are creating a more inclusive environment for their business.

Policymakers have chosen up to 20 companies to send letters, including Sequoia Capital, Haun Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, Tether, Ripple, Paxos, Kraken, FTX, Crypto.com, Coinbase, Binance.US, and Aave. According to them, there is a severe lack of publicly available data that would allow for an accurate evaluation of the largest digital asset firms and those dealing with investment in the United States.

Transparency, they believed, plays a crucial role in achieving racial and gender parity. According to a sample letter, twenty companies’ inclusion and diversity policies and data were considered for the items requested, starting in January 2021.

Males Prevail in the Financial Technology Sector

The investigation appeared to be conducted in response to investigations conducted on behalf of the House Financial Services Committee over the previous two years, with the declaration that significant work is still needed to improve inclusion and diversity at prestigious banks and investment firms. Companies were pressured by policymakers to respond by September 2nd of this year. The results from the other groups tended to corroborate the findings of the US policymakers.

There was a report published in 2020 by Digitalundivided that found Latina and Black women entrepreneurs received less than 1% of all venture capital. According to data compiled by Crunchbase, only 0.9% of female firm founders in the fintech sector have raised capital from venture capitalists. Jenny Guo, co-founder of Highstreet, has observed that men make up a disproportionately large share of the Web3 community and that there are relatively few spaces geared toward women (a Metaverse-based venue).