Adam Boulton: Keir Starmer should expect to come under vicious assault from day one if Labour wins landslide

Published

12 months ago

April 7, 2024

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No complacency.

The dictat from Labour high command is that nothing can be taken for granted – certainly not the 99% likelihood which Sir John Curtice places on Labour forming the next government, after the general election.

Victory, even a smashing one, is a possibility however – at least according to stubbornly consistent opinion polls.

The latest major survey, by YouGov, gives Sir Keir Starmer a landslide victory of a scale just short of Tony Blair’s landslide in 1997 when Labour won a 179-seat majority.

It gives Labour 403 MPs, the Conservatives 155, Liberal Democrats 49 and the SNP 23 – amounting to a 154 Labour overall majority.

Another recent large survey, by Survation using the same MRP technique of big samples analysed by region, is more apocalyptic for the Conservatives. It pushes the Tories down to around only 100 MPs and would give Sir Keir a record-breaking 256 majority.

Labour’s current representation in the Commons would double while the Conservatives would be more than halved.

The Reform Party would have no MPs.

In both these MRP polls and in the numerous national opinion polls over the last couple of years, prominent Conservative MPs and ministers are on course to lose their seats.

Those at risk include Iain Duncan Smith, Jacob Rees Mogg, Penny Mordaunt, Jeremy Hunt, Grant Shapps and James Cleverly.

Public opinion seems remarkably settled. Many Conservative MPs feel nobody is listening to them anymore.

Who would be in a landslide Labour government?

Just suppose the polls are right for once and the gap between the parties does not narrow in the run-up to voting, the nation, if not the ever-cautious Labour leadership, needs to start thinking what a landslide Labour government would look like.

There is nothing like the enthusiasm there was for the charismatic Tony Blair in 1997 – Keir Starmer has negative personal ratings, only much better than Rishi Sunak.

Voters are more disillusioned by politicians of any kind than they were then but a landslide would be a landslide and there are some comparisons to be drawn.

When a team wins comfortably it is difficult to change the line-up. It must be assumed that Prime Minister Starmer will flank himself with the same shadow cabinet in the same jobs.

In the great offices of state, neither David Lammy at the Foreign Office nor Chancellor Rachel Reeves would arrive with anything like the authority and reputation enjoyed by Robin Cook and Gordon Brown.

They would also be coming in at more difficult times economically and internationally.

At the Home Office, the veteran Yvette Cooper is a match for Jack Straw. She will need to deal credibly with immigration, currently the most inflamed topic of public concern.

Fresh creative thinking is more likely to come from less senior ministers such as Wes Streeting at health and deputy leader Angela Rayner.

Starmer plans to keep control by building up an executive government consisting of himself, Reeves, Rayner and Pat McFadden. Reeves and McFadden are primarily enforcers of economic discipline. Tensions may soon emerge even in this top group as Starmer and Reeves come under internal pressure to deliver tangible improvements in public services.

Labour will lack excuses if the polls are accurate

An overwhelming majority would deprive Labour of excuses not to deliver on what it has promised.

In its first 100 days, the new Labour government will have to enact what little it has trailed including VAT on private schools and a new deal for workers and trade unions.

It would be able get anything through parliament. This, along with trying not to put up unnecessary targets for the Conservatives, may explain the lack of specificity about the five missions which Starmer has set himself.

It may be that something similar to Blair’s pledge card, which set up modest achievable goals in the main areas of public concern, emerges during the campaign.

At present there are little more than warm words from Labour on improving growth, the NHS, green energy, education and childcare. Similarly Reeves is promising reorganisation and new quangos which only relate remotely to the high growth economy Labour says it needs.

In a landslide, more than half of Labour’s MPs will be first-timers at Westminster. There has been an effort to select “Starmtroopers” in winnable seats, but the leadership will not know them all.

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The new Labour parliamentary party will be younger. Millennial concerns such as housing and the cost of universities will be higher up the agenda.

The backfiring of Brexit on the Conservatives and gender self-ID on the Scottish government is likely to discourage bids to force the pace on divisive issues.

Neither his MPs nor the party conference gave Blair much trouble during his first term. Starmer would likely benefit as well from a mix of inexperience and gratitude.

With the new prime minister simultaneously committed to executive government and “powering up” the regions, challenge from within Labour is likely to come from the mayors in Manchester, Liverpool and London, assuming they are re-elected in their own right this year.

Her Majesty’s Opposition cannot be expected to put up much actual opposition if crushed in a landslide.

The Conservatives would be impotent in parliament and, if 1997-2005 is anything to go by, more interested in their own internal battles over party leadership.

The Liberal Democrats would relish their restoration as the UK’s official third force at the expense of the SNP. Little beyond virtue signalling can be expected from either of those parties.

The shadow of Tony Blair’s New Labour

For much of Blair’s time in office, constructive scrutiny of the government was led by the mainstream media, courted and cajoled by Peter Mandelson and Alastair Campbell.

There will be no repeat of this. The print and broadcast landscape has fragmented with many outlets more committed to campaigning than reporting fairly.

Like Barack Obama and Joe Biden in the US, Starmer should expect to come under vicious assault from day one. There will be no honeymoon.

After what will have been a “time for a change” election, the electorate may be inclined to give the new government the benefit of the doubt for a long period – but how long?

Starmer has repeatedly signalled that his government will need two terms to deliver real change. A landslide victory would provide the best basis on which to build.

In hindsight, Tony Blair has repeatedly bemoaned that his government got off to a slow start and failed to deliver as much as it could have done in its first term.

Far from planning for a landslide, his campaign team before his first victory were preoccupied with preparations for coalition with Paddy Ashdown’s Liberal Democrats.

Caution is one thing, making the best of your opportunities is another. The many voters telling the pollsters that they want a Labour victory must hope that someone, somewhere in Starmer’s rigid hierarchy is thinking hard about what they would do with a big win.

Politics

Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

Published

2 hours ago

April 4, 2025

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Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

The new trade tariffs announced by US President Donald Trump may place added pressure on the Bitcoin mining ecosystem both domestically and globally, according to one industry executive.

While the US is home to Bitcoin (BTC) mining manufacturing firms such as Auradine, it’s still “not possible to make the whole supply chain, including materials, US-based,” Kristian Csepcsar, chief marketing officer at BTC mining tech provider Braiins, told Cointelegraph.

On April 2, Trump announced sweeping tariffs, imposing a 10% tariff on all countries that export to the US and introducing “reciprocal” levies targeting America’s key trading partners.

Community members have debated the potential effects of the tariffs on Bitcoin, with some saying their impact has been overstated, while others see them as a significant threat.

Tariffs compound existing mining challenges

Csepcsar said the mining industry is already experiencing tough times, pointing to key indicators like the BTC hashprice.

Hashprice — a measure of a miner’s daily revenue per unit of hash power spent to mine BTC blocks — has been on the decline since 2022 and dropped to all-time lows of $50 for the first time in 2024.

According to data from Bitbo, the BTC hashprice was still hovering around all-time low levels of $53 on March 30.

“Hashprice is the key metric miners follow to understand their bottom line. It is how many dollars one terahash makes a day. A key profitability metric, and it is at all-time lows, ever,” Csepcsar said.

He added that mining equipment tariffs were already increasing under the Biden administration in 2024, and cited comments from Summer Meng, general manager at Chinese crypto mining supplier Bitmars.

“But they keep getting stricter under Trump,” Csepcsar added, referring to companies such as the China-based Bitmain — the world’s largest ASIC manufacturer — which is subject to the new tariffs.

Trump’s latest measures include a 34% additional tariff on top of an existing 20% levy for Chinese mining imports. In response, China reportedly imposed its own retaliatory tariffs on April 4.

BTC mining firms to “lose in the short term”

Csepcsar also noted that cutting-edge chips for crypto mining are currently massively produced in countries like Taiwan and South Korea, which were hit by new 32% and 25% tariffs, respectively.

“It will take a decade for the US to catch up with cutting-edge chip manufacturing. So again, companies, including American ones, lose in the short term,” he said.

Csepcsar also observed that some countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States region, including Russia and Kazakhstan, have been beefing up mining efforts and could potentially overtake the US in hashrate dominance.

“If we continue to see trade war, these regions with low tariffs and more favorable mining conditions can see a major boom,” Csepcsar warned.

As the newly announced tariffs potentially hurt Bitcoin mining both globally and in the US, it may become more difficult for Trump to keep his promise of making the US the global mining leader.

Trump’s stance on crypto has shifted multiple times over the years. As his administration embraces a more pro-crypto agenda, it remains to be seen how the latest economic policies will impact his long-term strategy for digital assets.

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Politics

Malta regulator fines OKX crypto exchange $1.2M for past AML breaches

Published

2 hours ago

April 4, 2025

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Malta regulator fines OKX crypto exchange .2M for past AML breaches

Cryptocurrency exchange OKX is under renewed regulatory scrutiny in Europe after Maltese authorities issued a major fine for violations of Anti-Money Laundering (AML) laws.

Malta’s Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit (FIAU) fined Okcoin Europe — OKX’s Europe-based subsidiary — 1.1 million euros ($1.2 million) after detecting multiple AML failures on the platform in the past, the authority announced on April 3.

While admitting that OKX has significantly improved its AML policies in the past 18 months, the authority “could not ignore” its past compliance failures from 2023, “some of which were deemed to be serious and systematic,” the FIAU notice said.

OKX was among the first crypto exchanges to receive a license under Europe’s new Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation via its Malta hub in January 2025.

The news of the $1.2 million penalty in Malta came after Bloomberg in March reported that European Union regulators were probing OKX for laundering $100 million in funds from the Bybit hack.

Bybit CEO Ben Zhou previously claimed that OKX’s Web3 proxy allowed hackers to launder about $100 million, or 40,233 Ether (ETH), from the $1.5 billion hack that occurred in February.

This is a developing story, and further information will be added as it becomes available.

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Politics

US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global $428K for wash trading

Published

3 hours ago

April 4, 2025

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US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global 8K for wash trading

Authorities in the US state of Massachusetts continue targeting unlawful cryptocurrency market practices, with a local court fining crypto financial services firm CLS Global.

A federal court in Boston on April 2 sentenced CLS Global on criminal charges related to fraudulent manipulation of crypto trading volume, according to an announcement from the Massachusetts US Attorney’s Office.

In addition to a $428,059 fine, the court prohibited CLS Global from offering services in the US for a probation period of three years.

CLS Global, a crypto market maker registered in the United Arab Emirates, in January pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit market manipulation and one count of wire fraud.

CLS agreed to manipulate the FBI’s “trap token” NexFundAI

The charges against CLS Global followed an undercover law enforcement operation involving NexFundAI, a token created by the FBI as part of a sting operation in May 2024.

CLS Global was among at least three firms that took the FBI’s bait and agreed to provide “market maker services” for NexFundAI, including a fraudulent scheme to attract investors to purchase the token.

In October 2024, the Securities and Exchange Commission announced fraud charges against CLS and its employee, Andrey Zhorzhes. The US securities regulator also filed complaints against two other NexFundAI manipulators, Hong Kong-linked ZM Quant Investment and Russia-linked Gotbit Consulting.

CLS Global’s profile

According to CLS Global CEO Filipp Veselov, the company was founded in 2017 to fill in a “huge gap in the market for high-quality market-making solutions and trading consulting.”

Prior to CLS, Veselov worked at the Russian cryptocurrency exchange platform Latoken, which is advertised as a “global digital asset exchange” and has about 370,000 followers on X.

The CLS team also includes chief revenue officer Pavel Singaevskii, who previously served as sales manager at Stex, a crypto platform that reportedly ceased operations without warning in 2023.

US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global $428K for wash trading — *Source:* *CLS Global*

According to CLS Global’s X page, the platform continues operating and has more than 110,000 followers at the time of publication.

How much wash trading is in crypto?

Wash trading is an illegal practice involving artificially inflating trading volume by repeatedly buying and selling the same asset, generating a misleading perception of demand.

According to a January 2025 report by the US blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis, the crypto market has at least $2.6 billion in estimated wash traded volumes, or just about 2% of total daily crypto trading volumes, as reported by CoinGecko.

Some studies indicate that wash trading makes up a bigger share of the crypto market.

In 2022, the US National Bureau of Economic Research reported that illegal wash trading may account for as much as 70% of average trading volumes on unregulated exchanges.

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