The America First Policy Institute is a think tank with enormous influence on the Trump Administration. Members of the Institute have joined the administration in senior positions. So, it was fitting for Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Paul Atkins, a Trump appointee, to launch “Project Crypto†in a speech delivered to the Institute.[1]
He began with this: “Today, I would like to discuss what Commissioner Hester Peirce and I are calling ‘Project Crypto,’ which will be the SEC’s north star in aiding President Trump in his historic efforts to make America the ‘crypto capital of the world.’â€[2] Chairman Atkins was speaking the day after the President’s Working Group (PWG) on Digital Assets released its 166-page report entitled “Strengthening American Leadership In Digital Financial Technology,â€[3] leaving no doubt about his alignment with the digital asset policies of the president who appointed him. The PWG report priorities for the SEC conform with the content of Atkins’s speech. Indeed, the PWG report was written in part by staff borrowed from the SEC.
In his Project Crypto speech, Chairman Atkins laid out a series of priorities for SEC staff, such as drafting “clear and simple rules of the road†for different crypto activities, including custody and trading, as well as allowing intermediaries like exchanges to launch “super-apps†offering a broad range of financial products and services. Chairman Atkins further announced that he has directed SEC staff to develop a comprehensive regulatory framework to bring cryptoasset distributions back onshore in the United States, eliminating the need to rely on offshore transaction structures and foundations. And he stressed that market participants must have “maximum choice†in how they custody and trade cryptoassets.
Chairman Atkins re-emphasized his view that most cryptoassets are not securities. But even for cryptoassets that are securities, he remarked, the rules need to be rewritten to facilitate offerings rather than obstruct them — and the SEC staff has been directed to make this happen. Offering an asset classified as a security should not result in treatment akin to Hester Prynne, who was forced to wear a “scarlet letter,†he remarked.
Chairman Atkins concluded his remarks with statements embracing a complete change of course for this industry from the prior administration:
As we advance these priorities, I look forward to working with my counterparts across the Administration to make the United States the crypto capital of the world. This represents more than a regulatory shift — it is a generational opportunity.
And, we will ensure that the next chapter of financial innovation is written right here in America.[4]
The Atkins SEC is famously open to new ideas. We have been commenting directly to the SEC and its Crypto Task Force (chaired by Commissioner Peirce) on the work of the Crypto Task Force and will continue to do so as new rules are written and published for public comment.
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