U.S. House Committees on Financial Services and Agriculture publish six principles for digital asset market structure legislation

The U.S. House Committees on Financial Services and Agriculture published a “Blueprint for Digital Assets in America” setting out six principles to guide federal legislation aimed at clarifying how digital assets are classified and regulated in the United States. The blueprint calls for a framework that promotes innovation while clearly distinguishing securities from non-securities; establishes an issuance regime under Securities and Exchange Commission jurisdiction with retail investor protections and required disclosures about digital asset networks; and regulates spot market exchanges and intermediaries handling non-security digital assets with requirements comparable to other financial firms. It also proposes customer-asset safeguards, including segregation of customer funds, use of qualified custodians, and protections in bankruptcy, alongside expanded Commodity Futures Trading Commission authority to impose customer protection, conflict-of-interest, execution, and disclosure requirements. A final principle seeks to avoid applying centralized, custodial regulatory models to decentralized protocols and to protect individuals’ right to self-custody. The committees plan to hold a second joint hearing in May on digital asset market structure legislation.