CryptoLink - July 2023 Updates

As anticipated, digital assets legislation came to a head in Congress in late July. The House Financial Services Committee and House Agriculture Committee jointly considered market structure legislation, while the House Financial Service Committee marked up and reported their long developing stablecoin bill. Both pieces of legislation are now ready for consideration in the full House of Representatives, likely this fall. Both bills achieved bipartisan support, if not bipartisan consensus. Unexpectedly, the stablecoin legislation, which Chairman Patrick McHenry (R-NC) and Ranking Member Maxine Water (D-CA) had been working on since this time last year proved to be more controversial than the market structure bill designed to reign in, and strongly opposed by, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler. The stablecoin bill ultimately received substantial pushback from the White House National Economic Council, complicating what should have been a consensus product. Ultimately, we should expect that the House will pass these bills with some bipartisan support. Though the Senate is not likely to take either up on an individual basis, they will almost certainly enter discussions around any year-end legislation.