CFTC Files Crypto Regulation Proposal After Clarity Act Fails

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has submitted to the Office of Management and Budget a proposal to regulate crypto asset transactions and crypto asset markets, according to a pending regulatory review notice on an OMB website.

The proposed rule, which has not yet been published on the site, was submitted Thursday (Sept. 17), according to the notice.

Bloomberg flagged the notice in a Friday (Sept. 18) report and said that the CFTC would have become the primary regulator for cryptocurrency under the Clarity Act, which failed to advance in the Senate this week, and that CFTC Chairman Michael Selig said in August that he would ask the agency’s staff to find ways to codify market structure for digital assets.

Selig drew attention to another report about the CFTC’s filing with the OMB by sharing it in a post on X with an eyes emoji.

Selig said in August that if Congress didn’t pass the Clarity Act, the CFTC would use its existing authorities to begin establishing a crypto asset market regime.

In remarks delivered at the Innovation Advisory Committee Conference in Washington, D.C., Selig said: “We owe it to the American people to do so. President Trump promised to deliver a crypto asset market structure, and we will help him deliver if Congress will not.”

The Clarity Act lost a big vote in the Senate on Tuesday (Sept. 15). PYMNTS reported that the procedural vote meant that the bill failed to advance and that the crypto industry was left staring at another stretch of operating domestically without comprehensive federal market structure legislation.

At the same time, members of both the crypto industry and the banking industry said after the failed vote that lawmakers still need to act and that regulatory certainty still matters.

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said in a Tuesday post on X that the cryptocurrency industry can’t wait on Congress anymore.

“The [Securities and Exchange Commission] and CFTC have the tools they need to create clear rules under existing authority, and I expect will begin working on this in earnest,” Armstrong said. “So clarity is coming to crypto regardless.”