Executive Summary
- Recent congressional efforts have sought to provide regulatory guardrails to the nascent cryptocurrency industry; for the most part these efforts have focused on identifying a primary federal agency with responsibility for crypto.
- The lack of a primary regulator is only part (and possibly a cause) of the regulatory patchwork of inconsistent agency regulations and guidance on various isolated aspects of crypto.
- Except in limited circumstances, taxation, or , the activity of most cryptocurrencies and the treatment of digital assets is currently largely unregulated in the United States.
Introduction
Recent months have seen unprecedented congressional efforts to address the regulatory challenge posed by cryptocurrencies and other digital assets – a market that did not exist prior to 2008 and late last year hit a market capitalization high of $3 trillion. In June, Senators Cynthia Lummis and Kirsten Gillibrand released a legislative proposal seeking to establish a complete regulatory framework for currencies and in the process establish the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) as the primary regulator of crypto. Just last week, Senators Debbie Stabenow and John Boozman released their own proposal that would require all digital commodity platforms to register with the CFTC – and in so doing would also designate the agency as the primary crypto regulator.
This, then, seems to be the theme of crypto legislation coming out of Congress . While other…
