Today, the Blockchain Association and the Crypto Council for Innovation have joined to demand that the Senate Banking Committee move forward with crypto market infrastructure legislation, the CLARITY Act. The letter authored by the two advocacy groups has garnered the support of more than 100 entities.
The legislation was approved by the US House of Representatives last year, yet it has been stuck in the Committee due to opposition from the banking industry, which fears competition.
The letter states:
“… we write to respectfully urge the Senate Banking Committee to notice and proceed towards a markup of the CLARITY Act to provide a comprehensive federal market structure framework for digital assets.”
And;
“The United States cannot risk a return to the previous era of regulation by enforcement, which perpetuated uncertainty for both builders and market participants. Market structure legislation would prevent that uncertainty by establishing clear jurisdictional boundaries, clear disclosure regimes, and fit-for-purpose rules that reflect the unique characteristics of digital assets and protect Americans.”
Addressing areas of possible disagreement with the banking industry, the digital asset sector requests the following:
- preserving activity or transaction-based consumer rewards tied to payment stablecoins,
- ensuring that the SEC and CFTC have clear authority to accommodate the evolution of tokenized financial instruments and distributed ledger technology, consistent with investor protections,
- protecting developers and service providers of decentralized technologies, as articulated in the bipartisan Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act (BRCA) in its current form,
- ensuring regulations are compatible with decentralized technology,
- improving efficiencies around disclosures and network token certification, and (vi) establishing clear federal requirements so market participants have a predictable regulatory baseline across all fifty states.
The political stasis caused by the banking industry has caused significant delays, and concerns are increasing that legislation may falter due to entrenched opinions.
