You can, it's just that having the cryptocurrency in the first place leaves a bad taste in some people's mouths.

I feel the biggest concern is about focus shift for Signal since doing one shady thing usually means other shady things will be done.

You can ignore it for now but how much will they push it over time to make it harder and harder to ignore? Will grandma accidentally buy tokens due to some dark pattern UI and then call you about it? Will you get constant messages from scammers trying to get you to send them tokens?

This might not happen but I feel it is a valid concern for a platform you wish to stay on longer term.

edit: And since the CEO of the token company has said he wishes to make future monetary donations to Signal they have an incentive for making the token do well.

Problem is that with the cryptocurrencies, it opens the app to whole new financial legal frameworks and agencies.

Not to mention that with the number of scams with cryptocurrencies It's not inconceivable that either Apple or Google will eventually ban them from App store (apps using cryptos)

You can for sure.

But it seems like a waste of resources by Signal, they could be making the chat part of the app better instead.