President-elect Donald Trump recently announced he plans to nominate former SEC Commissioner Paul Atkins to lead the agency, a move that sources say would likely bring a less hostile approach to the crypto industry.
Under the leadership of Chair Gary Gensler, the SEC has often received pushback for what critics call a “regulation by enforcement approach,” given the commission has filed enforcement actions against a host of crypto firms and exchanges.
“We have a big tool kit, and we've always gravitated toward enforcement in this area as our tool of choice,” Peirce said at the crypto-focused conference.
Peirce added that she would like the SEC to provide more clarity on which crypto assets it has jurisdiction over, as well as which ones it doesn’t.
Summer Mersinger, a Republican commissioner at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, said later at the conference that she would like to see the SEC and CFTC sit down to discuss which crypto tokens qualify as securities and which qualify as commodities. She contended that the agencies could release a “public framework” on that without an act of Congress.
This May, the House passed the Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act, or FIT 21 Act, which would give the CFTC new oversight of the digital commodities market, while designating the SEC as the regulator for the digital securities market. It also would require the agencies to issue joint rulemakings on the issue and allow digital asset intermediaries to dually register with the SEC and CFTC.
However, the bill never reached a vote in the Senate, meaning it would need to be reintroduced again in the next Congress.
Earlier at the conference, Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., the incoming chair of the Senate Banking Committee; Rep. French Hill, R-Ark., the incoming chair of the House Financial Services Committee; and Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., all said it's likely Congress passes the FIT 21 Act in 2025.
