U.S. investment bank Bernstein forecasts that existing regulatory agencies will likely introduce new regulations to compensate for the time spent negotiating the Clarity Act, following the failure of the vote to end discussions on the bill.
According to reports on Wednesday, Bernstein anticipates that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) will aggressively and swiftly develop regulations related to digital assets. This move is driven by their intention to establish regulatory clarity independently if Congress fails to pass the legislation.
The expected regulations from the SEC and CFTC include: establishing a token classification system, implementing protective measures for decentralized finance (DeFi) developers and self-custody services, creating innovation exemptions for stock tokenization, shortening the approval period for real-world asset (RWA) perpetual futures, and revising classification criteria for sports event contracts and swaps.
Both the SEC and CFTC have signaled their readiness to establish regulatory clarity on their own, even if the Clarity Act fails to pass.
Previously, SEC Chair Gary Gensler stated in a late July interview with CNBC that if the Senate fails to pass the Clarity Act, the SEC is fully prepared, willing, and capable of issuing regulations related to digital assets.
CFTC Chair Micheal Selig also indicated during last month’s Innovation Advisory Committee meeting that if the Clarity Act’s progress is hindered by Democratic opposition, he would leverage existing authority to regulate the digital asset market.