U.S. lawmakers are quickly gaining ground on bills to regulate digital assets with votes set to happen for stablecoin legislation and an updated version of an overall market structure bill coming soon.
During The Digital Chamber DC Blockchain Summit on Wednesday, House Financial Services Committee Chair French Hill, R-Ark., alluded to a revised draft of a market structure bill coming imminently following work done last year in his committee. A bill like that has not been introduced yet.
The bill, called the Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act, nicknamed FIT 21, passed the House last year with 71 Democrats voting in support of the bill, including former Speaker of the House Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California. Now, Hill says he has taken in "technical assistance" and plans to publish a revised draft in "the next few days."
The market structure bill from last year would have granted more power and funding to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to oversee crypto spot markets and "digital commodities," particularly bitcoin, and set parameters for the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Passing such a bill is viewed as being more challenging to get through than a bill to regulate stablecoins, given the complexity. When FIT21 was passed through the House, it was written from a position of legislating against former SEC Chair Gary Gensler and former President Joe Biden, which caused concessions to be made, which is now not necessary, The Digital Chamber President Cody Carbone previously told The Block.
Meanwhile, work on a bill to regulate stablecoins is well underway as both the House and Senate work to figure out differences, marking a progressive change compared to previous years.
The Senate Banking Committee voted earlier this month to advance the GENIUS Act (Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins), cosponsored by members of both parties. The bill aims to create a regulatory framework for stablecoins, defining when issuers fall under state or federal oversight. However, some Democrats had argued it wasn't ready for "prime time" and tried to make changes to the bill without success.
On the House side, Republicans, including Rep. Bryan Steil, released draft legislation in February to regulate stablecoins, called the STABLE Act.
Steil, who also spoke at the summit on Wednesday, said the Senate and House bills are "roughly call it 80% similar, " adding that they are looking to close that gap.
The full text of that bill will be introduced later on Wednesday and a markup in "the very near future," Steil said.
"We will then be in a position to move to a markup in the very near future in the House as these both then move forward," Steil said.
There are some differences between the two versions, and Steil said he expected to have conversations around what a state pathway looks like and what role the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency could have.
"All of us, meaning the administration, the House and the Senate — all of us share a very unified goal of getting legislative text, ultimately all the way across the line," Steil said.
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