Crypto regulation in 2026: SEC’s ambitious agenda meets a more empowered CFTC

Regulators are entering a second year of sweeping change under the Trump administration, with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission pursuing an ambitious agenda and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission stepping into a more prominent role in cryptocurrency oversight.

In the Biden administration, a year before, the CFTC and SEC were viewed as locked in a "turf war" over digital assets. Former CFTC Chair Rostin Behnam argued that most cryptocurrencies fell under the agency’s commodity jurisdiction, while former SEC Chair Gary Gensler maintained that — with the exception of bitcoin — most tokens were securities.

That dynamic shifted this past year. In September, CFTC Acting Chair declared that the turf war was over and said the agencies would be working together on regulating crypto. And over the past year, the SEC and CFTC have issued joint guidance that said registered exchanges are not prohibited from facilitating the trading of certain spot crypto products and also said that they planned to prioritize 24/7 markets, perpetual contracts, and decentralized finance.

Howard Fischer, partner at Moses & Singer LLP, who was previously senior trial counsel at the SEC, noted the recent change in the relationship between the two agencies.

"Ever since I was at the SEC and since then, the SEC has always looked at the CFTC as kind of like the younger sibling — not as good looking or as athletic — but mom makes you take them to parties so they don't feel left out," Fischer said in an interview with The Block.

"For the first time, since I can remember, the SEC and the CFTC appear to be working together in a way that's a lot more cooperative," Fischer added.

In 2026, Fischer said he expects more cooperation between the two agencies and said that will drive next year's agenda.

The SEC's plans 

And the SEC has a packed to-do list.

In December, while speaking at the Blockchain Association Policy Summit in Washington, D.C., Atkins said, "you ain't seen nothing yet." Atkins has started on his ambitious agenda by announcing plans for a "token taxonomy" to delineate between what cryptocurrencies would be securities. He has also embarked on "Project Crypto" to update the SEC's rules around digital assets and is pushing an "innovation exemption" to fast-track crypto products.

Over the past year, the SEC approved listing standards for certain crypto exchange-traded funds, which led to several firms launching ETFs tracking assets like DOGE, SOL, and XRP. The agency has also released numerous guidance documents and statements, including declaring that liquid staking is outside the scope of the securities laws, and also said that proof-of-stake staking activities do not constitute securities transactions.

More recently, the SEC's Division of Trading and Markets published guidance for broker-dealers on how to custody "crypto asset securities."

Meanwhile, tokenization has become a hot topic and has become a priority for the SEC. Tokenization can mean a variety of different types of assets, but it is essentially a real-world asset going on the blockchain.

Fischer was skeptical about tokenization, saying that around-the-clock trading is a cool idea, but said the implications are complicated. The SEC's regulatory movement on tokenization could take time, he said. He compared it to the SEC's climate-related disclosure rules and said the SEC staff were not "climate scientists," so figuring out what is material for investors was complex.

Those rules were adopted under the Biden administration in 2024 and are being legally challenged.

"You have people who are regulators, who are experienced in how securities markets and capital markets work," Fischer said. "They're not necessarily scientists, and the people who are the scientists might not necessarily have the easiest time talking to the people who are the securities experts and the regulators and vice versa."

Ophelia Snyder, co-founder of 21shares, said it's not clear whether new rules are necessary.

"There's still an outstanding question in my mind that needs to be answered for a regulatory perspective, which is — in the United States, are we going to make crypto a new special thing or is it going to fit inside of existing infrastructure?" she said in an interview.

Snyder also noted that the exemptive relief and no-action letters will be a part of the SEC's agenda in 2026. She called SEC's recent no-action letter to the Deposit Trust Company, clearing it to offer a tokenization service for custodied RWAs, "a watershed moment." Under the No-Action Letter, DTC can tokenize a defined set of assets that includes Russell 1000 constituents, ETFs tracking major U.S. equity indices, and U.S. Treasury bills, bonds, and notes.

The letter says that industry can try out tokenization in a limited capacity, Snyder said.

"These are limited scope, limited participant, limited size with restrictions," she said. "The reason they do it that way is you can test it out."

CFTC steps up

The CFTC has also had a busy year, embarking on a "Crypto Sprint" to focus on clarifying rules for the industry, withdrawing guidance focused on the "actual delivery" of digital assets, and also setting the framework that exchanges can list regulator-approved spot crypto products. Acting Chair Caroline Pham has led those efforts, but is set to join crypto finance company MoonPay as CFTC Chair Michael Selig steps into the chairmanship role.

President Donald Trump tapped Selig to lead the CFTC in October when he was serving as chief counsel for the SEC's Crypto Task Force. He was then confirmed by the Senate on Dec. 18. Selig is set to take on his role during a pivotal time as lawmakers are looking to put the CFTC at the helm for crypto regulation. 

"I have often said that they're the ones who are actually the most powerful agency out of all the agencies that are touching crypto," said Saga CEO Rebecca Liao. "A lot of focus has been on the SEC because the SEC has been more restrictive, but the CFTC actually has the ability to open the floodgates."

Liao said she thinks bitcoin should be a focus for the CFTC since it has been deemed a commodity for years.

"Honestly, if they did nothing but focus on bitcoin over the course of the next year, that already will open up a lot of the market because inevitably, what happens is that the market follows the movement of bitcoin," she said. "So if bitcoin is doing well and it's healthy, then that really seeds the rest of the crypto ecosystem."

Both the CFTC and SEC are entering 2026 with just a few commissioners at the helm. The SEC has Chair Paul Atkins and Republican Commissioners Mark Uyeda and Hester Peirce. Lone Democratic Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw's term is set to end at the end of the year, leaving two empty spots.

Selig is the lone commissioner at the CFTC. Both agencies require five commissioners, with no more than three of the same political party, and await Trump's move to appoint leaders to fill those spots.

"I don't think anybody wants there to be senior vacancies in the U.S. government," 21shares' Snyder said. "I don't think that is an ideal situation for anybody."

However, the agencies will still move forward, she said.

"A lot of the strategic agenda is typically set by the executive branch, and the executive branch is ultimately going to appoint these commissioners anyway, so I don't expect it to cause major strategic changes, although it may enable better execution," she said.

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