SEC to Create Crypto Market Rules if Congress Fails to Pass Clarity Act

The SEC will write crypto market rules itself if Congress fails to pass the Clarity Act, chairman Paul Atkins said. The agency is "ready, willing, and able to come out with rules" covering the same ground, he told CNBC on Monday, and would "stand ready to provide that" should the bill not clear the Senate.

"Statute is the way to future-proof something," Atkins said, adding that the market needs "the certainty of a statute" so the framework does not shift with each administration. He said he remains optimistic Congress will pass the bill and that the SEC is providing technical assistance, a case he pressed again on Tuesday in a post on X saying he is "committed to supporting Congress in advancing" it.

Where the bill stands The Clarity Act passed the House 294-134 in July last year and cleared the Senate Banking Committee 15-9 in May, with nine Democrats against. It has not reached a floor vote, where it would need 60 votes, and the Senate breaks for recess in August. The bill would hand the CFTC exclusive jurisdiction over spot markets in digital commodities, moving most tokens outside the SEC's reach. Senate Democrats have recently come out against the latest version of the bill, objecting to the proposed ethics provisions covering officials’ crypto dealings as not good enough. Whether stablecoins can pay yield also remains unsettled. Late last week, Senate Majority Leader John Thune signaled to reporters that the Clarity Act would likely not clear the chamber before the August recess and the Senate has since shelved it for the time being.

The fallback The SEC has already built much of the alternative. Atkins's Project Crypto, announced in November, produced a Regulation Crypto rulemaking package on the agency's 2026 agenda covering token registration exemptions, a safe harbor for decentralizing projects, broker-dealer custody and trading venues. He has described it as a bridge to the Clarity Act. The limits of that route are the point he is making. The SEC and CFTC's March guidance classifying 16 tokens as digital commodities, Bitcoin and Ethereum among them, is administrative, and can be withdrawn by a future administration without a vote in Congress.