Regulation
The FIT21 bill goes to the Senate: should we really be excited?
The U.S. House passed the FIT21 bill, which many see as the first step toward creating a clear regulatory framework for digital assets.
71 Democrats and 208 Republicans voted in favor of the cryptocurrency market structure bill.
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Posted May 23, 2024 at 1:28am EST.
The US House of Representatives has passed a bill clarifying how cryptocurrency markets should be regulated under the jurisdiction of securities and commodities regulators.
The FIT21 I count it passed the House with 71 Democrats and 208 Republicans in favor, with 136 House members voting against.
The bill will now be considered in the Senate before arriving on President Joe Biden’s desk at the White House, but that is unlikely to happen before early next year.
“The SEC and CFTC are currently engaged in a food fight for control of these asset classes,” Rep. Patrick McHenry said before the House vote.
On the other hand, one of the bill’s major opponents, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, said that the bill would set the regulation of cryptocurrencies as a “no man’s land” and said that the legislation would “deregulate cryptocurrencies and some traditional securities” to a level that raises serious concerns. From.
FIT21 would provide greater oversight of cryptocurrency spot markets to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) under the “digital commodities” label. Meanwhile, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) would have oversight over “restricted digital assets”.
Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong declared the bill is passing a resounding victory for clear crypto rules and a big step towards sensible regulation of the industry.
“It is an important step in providing long-awaited regulatory clarity for cryptocurrencies, protecting US consumers, and promoting American innovation,” a16z said.
This view was shared by many other market participants, but many other leading industry figures suggested that it really wasn’t something to get excited about.
“I don’t think FIT121 is actually a win, it just moves agencies from the SEC to the CFTC, there are still the same issues of crypto tokens not actually being commodities and not fitting into the arcane frameworks of commodity futures, just as they do not fit into the arcane frameworks of titles,” She said Founder of the “0xfoobar” clusters.
For those who assume the CFTC has historically been more lenient on cryptocurrencies than the SEC, he cited an example from six months ago, when the commodities regulator sued ZeroEx Inc for implementing the 0x protocol and the Matcha decentralized exchange aggregator (DEX). The CFTC has argued that leveraged token offerings should only be offered in compliance with the Commission’s regulations.
Also famous cryptocurrency lawyer Gabriel Shapiro he underlined that handing over authority to a different regulator, in the hope that it would not be so hostile to the industry, was potentially not in the industry’s best interests.
“It doesn’t even move agencies; The SEC would still have enormous power. It provides for a dual regulatory regime, divided between the SEC and the CFTC,” She said Shapiro on X.
“It does so by giving the CFTC authority it has never had: regulatory authority over a spot commodity market.”
Another pseudonymous industry watcher, who goes by “@zeroxkeegan” on X, even went so far as to do so To say that FIT21 gets killed in the Senate might be the best case scenario.