SEC Chair Atkins Unveils "Project Crypto"
Commentary by Gage Raju-Salicki
SEC Chair Paul S. Atkins unveiled "Project Crypto," a plan to transform the agency’s approach to digital assets.
At an American Leadership in the Digital Finance Revolution event, hosted by the America First Policy Institute, Mr. Atkins said the "Project Crypto" initiative supports President Trump’s goal of making the US the "crypto capital of the world." He cited the recent blueprint published by the President's Working Group on Digital Assets ("PWG Report") and directed the SEC to coordinate with the agency's Crypto Task Force on rule proposals.
In coordination with Commissioner Hester Peirce, Mr. Atkins highlighted the following objectives for Project Crypto:
- Onshoring Crypto. Mr. Atkins called for the SEC to establish a regulatory framework to support crypto asset distributions within the United States. He criticized past regulatory uncertainty, stating that most crypto assets "are not securities," and urged the development of "bright-line rules" to help market participants determine how assets should be categorized.
- Enhancing Investor Freedom. Mr. Atkins emphasized the need to expand investor choice in crypto custody and trading, calling self-custody "a core American value."
- Super-Apps. Mr. Atkins outlined plans to enable the development of "super-apps" that allow securities intermediaries to offer a full suite of services—such as trading in crypto asset securities, non-security crypto assets, and traditional securities—under a "single license."
- Regulatory Fixes. He directed SEC staff to amend regulations to accommodate on-chain software systems in securities markets. He stated that decentralized and operator-run systems alike "should have a place" in US markets and argued that regulation should not impose intermediaries "for the sake of forcing intermediation." He also suggested that updates to Reg NMS may be necessary to support tokenized securities trading.
- Innovation Exemption. Mr. Atkins proposed an "innovation exemption" to allow market participants to quickly launch new technologies and business models that fall outside the SEC’s existing regulatory frameworks.
Mr. Atkins pledged to make the United States the driving force behind the next era of financial innovation, calling the moment a "generational opportunity" to reaffirm US leadership in global markets.
Commentary
It’s been a banner week for crypto—and perhaps even a bit overwhelming for crypto lawyers given all of the news. The SEC’s “Project Crypto” is a massive shift for the agency and will likely take some time to fully realize. Of particular note is the push for specific notice and comment rulemaking for “crypto asset distributions, and trading,”—but even more importantly, that the Commission is going to leverage interpretive rules, exemptive authority, and other tools in its toolbelt to promote innovation.
It’s also noteworthy that Chair Atkins has taken a welcoming stance to digital assets qualifying as securities, pushing for a framework that allows for these types of tokens. With that said, however, it is clearly his view that tokens themselves are generally not securities. Moreover, there’s a desire to open the entire equities market to tokenization—so this makes complete sense.
When compared to the President’s Working Group on Digital Asset Markets Report, there’s a clear dialogue between these two projects, and a vision for on-chain markets. There is still a question as to how to get there through specific rulemaking, but this administration’s SEC has made its point with this statement: on-chain markets will happen in the near term, and it is willing to try to figure out how to get there.
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