Gov. Ned Lamont said Tuesday his wife’s investment firm is pulling back in Connecticut after critics questioned the move to Stamford of a New York financial technology company that negotiated $5 million in state aid.

Speaking to reporters following a speech to a gathering of municipal officials at the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, the governor said Annie Lamont is finding it difficult to invest in Connecticut because the combination of her work as an investor and his role as governor are dogged by ethical questions he blames on politics.

The governor has said little publicly until recently about his wife’s investments through Oak HC/FT, a venture capital firm she founded. He said nothing on Monday about Annie Lamont’s connection to the Digital Currency Group when he announced the company’s move to Connecticut at an early morning press conference in Stamford.

When asked if financial investments were not worth the effort due to political criticism, Lamont said, “I think you got it about right.’’

“Annie is in Nashville, setting up companies there, because Connecticut is pretty complicated,” he said. “It’s probably a lot easier to start up that groundbreaking business in Nashville than it is in Stamford.”

The Lamonts have not said how much Oak HC/FT, a private firm, invested in the Digital Currency Group. The investment in Sema4 was valued at $66 million earlier this year.

On Monday, Lamont announced the move of Digital Currency Group, or DCG, to Stamford from New York. Annie Lamont sold her financial interest in the blockchain technology company in April, seven months ago.

DCG has several investors, among them Oak HC/FT, the venture capital firm where Annie Lamont is managing partner.

Blockchain is a ledger where transactions of cybercurrencies, such as Bitcoin, are recorded. It functions like a chain of digital “blocks” with records of transactions.

The questions and criticism from some Republicans followed by several days similar questions about investments in Sema4, a health data company, by Annie Lamont’s venture capital firm. It’s one of four companies that received a state contract for COVID-19 testing.

Lamont said his family has not made any profit from Sema4 and he renewed his pledge to donate earnings to charity.

The governor, speaking to reporters following remarks at an earlier event at the UConn School of Business in Hartford, said his wife’s firm sold its interest six months ago “not at a big gain but a lot less than what it sold for just a couple of months later. So stop repeating the lies coming from political opponents.”

David Lehman, commissioner of economic development, believed DCG would be an “amazing asset” to add to tech companies setting up headquarters in Connecticut, Lamont said. It received the “exact same formulaic earn-as-you grow incentives as most other companies get,” he said.

Lehman said in an interview Tuesday he was introduced to DCG in October 2020 by Stamford’s economic development director, Thomas Madden. A letter of intent to commit to Connecticut was signed in August, four months after Annie Lamont’s firm sold its investment, he said.

Lehman said the governor and Annie Lamont recused themselves from negotiations with DCG.

A few Republicans on Twitter cited DCG’s move shortly after disclosures of investments by Annie Lamont’s firm in Sema4, a health care tech company that has a state contract to perform COVID-19 testing in Connecticut.

Lamont said his wife had disclosed DCG to state ethics officials as one of 1,000 companies on a special list.

“Digital Currency Group is one of really dozens of great companies that have moved to the state over the last year,’’ Lamont said. “This is a real contrast to the UBS building, which is sitting empty, which is old finance. DCG is new finance.’’

DCG was one of about 1,000 companies on a so-called recusal list that later was removed because the Lamonts no longer had any ownership, the governor said.

He called DCG the “most significant cryptocurrency company in the world.” It could have located “anywhere they wanted to” and chose Connecticut, he said.

“I was celebrating that fact. Did we get any financial benefit out of that? No. But Connecticut gets a big benefit,” Lamont said.

The governor said he and his wife own “about .01% of Sema4, despite what you read in the press and what you hear from political opponents who have not created a job in this state.”

Lamont said an alternative would have been to not award a state contract to Sema4, one of four companies testing for COVID-19, and do less testing and no genetic sequencing.

The state’s ethics office found no conflict of interest with the state contract with Sema4.

Christopher Keating can be reached at ckeating@courant.com.