The Senate Agriculture Committee released its own market structure bill, which addresses digital products and how the Commodity Futures Trading Commission could oversee that sector of the cryptocurrency market.
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the narrative
We have a new bill on the structure of the crypto market! Are we any closer to this bill being approved by Congress? More or less.
Why is it important
The release of the first bill by the Senate Agriculture Committee is a key step. The released draft has a number of parts that will likely be updated or require agreement between Republicans and Democrats before it can move further, but now at least we have confirmation that lawmakers and their staff are still working on this.
breaking it
The new bill defines digital products and explains how Congress would like the CFTC to regulate them as it moves the agency closer to being the primary overseer of the cryptocurrency spot market.
The text of the bill included several sections in brackets, indicating areas where lawmakers had not yet reached firm agreement on what the final text should say. These bracketed sections included items as simple as definitions, as well as more complex rulemaking instructions to the CFTC.
“The CFTC plays a critical role in maintaining the integrity and stability of our financial and derivatives markets,” committee chairman John Boozman said in a statement. “As Congress works to expand the commission’s authority to oversee trading in commodity digital assets, it is essential that we also ensure that it has the tools, staff, and resources necessary to carry out this new mission, along with its current responsibilities. Strengthening this institution better protects consumers, fosters innovation, promotes transparency, and defends liquid and resilient markets.”
Sen. Cory Booker said in a statement that the bill was “a first step” but that lawmakers “still have a lot of work to do before moving the legislation out of committee.”
“I am specifically concerned about the lack of resources and bipartisan commissioners at the CFTC, which impede regulatory arbitrage, as well as the ongoing corruption of public officials and whether Congress has created the right barriers to prevent those misdeeds,” he said. “I urge my colleagues and external stakeholders to come together to address these issues.”
One provision in the draft would require the CFTC to have at least two commissioners and commissioners from minority parties before it can begin making rules. Another provision addressed concerns about conflicts of interest, but both provisions had brackets suggesting the wording or the provisions themselves could change before the bill is finalized.
Crypto industry representatives seemed to appreciate that the bill is still moving forward, despite the recent unprecedented government shutdown and the dwindling amount of time left in the year for Congress to do anything.
In a statement, Blockchain Association CEO Summer Mersinger called the release of the draft “another important step,” while DeFi Education Fund CEO Amanda Tuminelli said it was “good to see the [Agriculture] The committee advances the market structure.”
Ji Hun Kim, executive director of the Crypto Council for Innovation, called the draft “significant positive progress toward establishing a comprehensive and appropriate market structure framework for digital products in the US,” in a statement.
The process still needs to be coordinated with that of the Senate Banking Committee, Mersinger said in his statement.
“We hope that the section left open for DeFi will be completed with strong developer protections that clearly distinguish centralized intermediaries from software developers without custody or control of other people’s money,” Tuminelli said.
Looking ahead, the specific path to approval is a bit confusing. A person who works on policymaking in DC told CoinDesk that there are approximately three work weeks in December for Congress, severely limiting the amount of time available for lawmakers to hold hearings and votes on cryptocurrency legislation this year. That means any work on the bill is unlikely to happen until next year, this person said, a view shared by Ron Hammond, Wintermute’s head of Policy and Advocacy.
Hammond told CoinDesk earlier this week that one or both committees could hold a markup hearing and vote on leaving the committee by the end of the year, but it would require a lot of work.
And even then, the bills would have to be combined before any potential Senate vote. Once that happens, the combined market structure bill would move to the House, which could vote on the Senate version (as it did with the Genius Act) or try to include some of its own priorities.
“I think the House is going to find itself in the awkward position of having to accept what the Senate produces,” Chainlink head of public policy Adam Minehardt said on CoinDesk TV on Thursday.
The House might want to make sure that some form of its own bill, the Clarity Act, is included in whatever President Donald Trump signs, but “the Senate will still be in the driver’s seat,” he said.
Regardless of how it turns out, the bill won’t reach Trump’s desk until the House has voted on the floor, and that could take us well into 2026 (and the election season) before he can sign it.
Wednesday
- 15:30 UTC (10:30 am ET) The Senate Banking Committee will hold a confirmation vote for several nominees, including FDIC Chairman nominee Travis Hill.
- 20:00 UTC (3:00 pm ET) The Senate Agriculture Committee will hold a confirmation hearing for CFTC chairman nominee Mike Selig.
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