SEC Will Ghostwrite Its Own Crypto Rules if Congress Leaves Them on Read 📜

The Securities and Exchange Commission is prepared to issue its own crypto market structure rules if the Clarity Act fails to clear the Senate, SEC Chairman Paul Atkins said. The agency is "ready, willing, and able to come out with rules" covering the same ground, Atkins told CNBC on Monday, and would "stand ready to provide that" should the bill not pass. "Statute is the way to future-proof something," Atkins said, adding the market needs "the certainty of a statute" so the framework does not shift with each administration. He said he remains optimistic Congress will pass the bill and that the SEC is providing technical assistance, a case he pressed again on Tuesday in a post on X saying he is "committed to supporting Congress in advancing" it.

The Clarity Act passed the House 294-134 in July last year and cleared the Senate Banking Committee 15-9 in May, with nine Democrats against. It has not reached a floor vote, where it would need 60 votes, and the Senate breaks for recess in August. The bill would hand the Commodity Futures Trading Commission exclusive jurisdiction over spot markets in digital commodities, moving most tokens outside the SEC's reach. Senate Democrats have recently come out against the latest version of the bill, objecting to the proposed ethics provisions covering officials' crypto dealings as not strong enough. Whether stablecoins can pay yield also remains unsettled. Late last week, Senate Majority Leader John Thune signaled to reporters that the Clarity Act would likely not clear the chamber before the August recess and the Senate has since shelved it for the time being.

The SEC has already built much of the alternative. Atkins's Project Crypto, announced in November, produced a Regulation Crypto rulemaking package on the agency's 2026 agenda covering token registration exemptions, a safe harbor for decentralizing projects, broker-dealer custody, and trading venues. He has described it as a bridge to the Clarity Act. The limits of that route are the point he is making. The SEC and CFTC's March guidance classifying 16 tokens as digital commodities, $BTC and $ETH among them, is administrative and can be withdrawn by a future administration without a vote in Congress.

Separately, three $BTC holders have sued Apple over a counterfeit Sparrow Wallet app they say drained a combined $1.8 million. The complaint, filed on July 24 in the Northern District of California, brings eight counts including fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and strict products liability. Each plaintiff entered a seed phrase into the app, according to the filing. James Ramirez lost 7.4 $BTC, put at $875,000; Christopher Ellis $840,000; and Jalen Delgado 1.05 $BTC, put at $120,000. Sparrow Wallet is a Bitcoin-only wallet that uses its own implementation.

Russia's Federal Security Service said it has charged Telegram founder Pavel Durov with aiding terrorist activity and placed him on an international wanted list. The FSB's public relations center said Wednesday that Durov was charged under Part 1.1 of Article 205.1 of the Russian criminal code, according to local news agency Interfax.