Written by: Yangz, Techub News

Unlike the gradual recovery of temperatures in recent days, since Bitcoin fell below $90,000 on February 25, the cryptocurrency market has been declining. At around 10:50 today, Bitcoin fell below the $80,000 mark, hitting a new low in the past three and a half months. Coingalss data shows that in the past 24 hours, the total liquidation amount of the entire network reached US$728 million, of which the long liquidation was about US$621 million and the short liquidation was about US$107 million. In addition, according to Alternative.me data, although the cryptocurrency panic and greed index has rebounded compared to yesterday, it is still in a "extreme panic state." (Recommended reading: "The cryptocurrency market suffered a full-scale sell-off. Why did this round of plunge start?")

However, in this panic market, a series of recent actions by US financial regulators have hinted that the previous tough attitude towards cryptocurrencies is softening, and the "ice" of the regulation of the previous institution full of hostility is slowly melting.

The attitude of the new US SEC

If the previous US SEC led by Gary Gensler was full of hostility towards the cryptocurrency industry, then the attitude of the new US SEC can be described as an active embrace. Since Gary Gensler officially stepped down on January 21, the new US SEC, led by Acting Chairman Mark Uyeda, is working hard to change its appearance in people's hearts.

In the past week, the US SEC has successively concluded its investigation and enforcement actions against OpenSea, Robinhood Crypto, Uniswap Labs, and Gemini, and officially revoked the lawsuit against Coinbase, planning to revoke the lawsuit against ConsenSys and MetaMask. In addition, Binance and the US SEC submitted a joint motion in mid-month to apply to suspend the lawsuit for 60 days on the grounds that "the newly established cryptocurrency working group may have an impact on the case." This is the first time that Mark Uyeda has requested a suspension of cryptocurrency-related litigation since he served as acting chairman. Affected by this, the Tron Foundation and Justin Sun also joined hands with the US SEC to submit a joint motion to suspend the lawsuit.

In addition, for the controversial Memecoin, the US SEC has also changed its past ambiguityWith a double-minded attitude, he issued clear guidance, saying that it "does not belong to securities, but is similar to collectibles." The US SEC believes that transactions regarding Memecoin do not involve securities issuance and sales under the federal securities laws. Therefore, individuals involved in the issuance and sale of Memecoin do not need to register their transactions with the Commission under the Securities Act of 1933, nor do they need to comply with the registration exemption clauses in the Securities Act. Of course, the department also notes that buyers or holders of Memecoin are not protected by federal securities laws.

Perhaps because of the objective situation of the recent market cooling, coupled with the active and frequent signal release of the US SEC, people have begun to observe the huge changes it has made. In fact, since the establishment of the new US SEC, various actions have not been stopped.

The day after Gary Gensler's official resignation, Mark Uyeda announced the establishment of a cryptocurrency task force, led by Hester Peirce, "committed to developing a comprehensive and clear regulatory framework for cryptocurrency assets." Then on January 24, the US SEC officially revoked the crypto asset accounting standard SAB-121, which was the "first shot" of a comprehensive reform. Since then, the US SEC has begun to reduce the size of cryptocurrency law enforcement, transfer some lawyers and staff to other departments, and form a new task team to announce top ten tasks such as checking the status of different types of crypto assets under the Securities Act, and providing clear statements on the methods used to approve or disapprove crypto ETFs. Next, we saw various news about the US SEC’s trial of ETFs, such as publicly soliciting comments on Grayscale Litecoin ETFs, accepting 19b-4 applications for Grayscale Solana ETFs, accepting applications for Grayscale XRP trust conversion ETFs, accepting 19b-4 applications submitted by Cboe BZX on adding staking functions to 21Shares Ethereum ETFs, etc.

Everything is heralding a completely different image to the new SEC.

Other regulatory progress besides the US SEC

In addition to the US SEC's active reform in cryptocurrency regulation, other regulatory progress is also worthy of attention.

The U.S. House of Representatives Funding Committee recently passed the resolution to abolish the IRS's "DeFi Broker Rules" with a vote of 26 to 16, which is a big benefit for DeFi. It should be noted that, the resolution will also need to be passed by the House and Senate majority and will be signed by the president before it can take effect.

In addition, legislation on stablecoins became the focus at the recent first hearing of the U.S. Senate Bank Digital Assets Subcommittee chaired by Cynthia Lummis. Lummis stressed that stablecoins will be the first issue for the Subcommittee in the future and “planned to develop a bipartisan legislative framework for stablecoins and their market structure in the coming months.” Former Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) chairman Timothy Massad also suggested at the hearing that lawmakers should prioritize the legal framework of stablecoins and postpone issues related to market structures. Additionally, Virginia Democrat Mark Warner asked panelists to discuss the possibility of stablecoin users performing the KYC process.

At the same time, more and more departments are accelerating their hearing from the cryptocurrency industry. For example, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recently hired Galaxy Digital legal counsel Tyler Williams as a consultant for digital assets and blockchain technology. According to Michael Saylor, he recently met with French Hill, chairman of the U.S. House Financial Services Committee, and proposed a digital asset regulatory framework to him.

These initiatives from regulators and industry leaders all mark the gradual maturity of the regulatory environment in the cryptocurrency field. Against this background, although the current market is cold, from a long-term perspective, the cryptocurrency market may usher in a healthier and standardized development period.

In addition to regulation, the progress of strategic Bitcoin reserves in each state is different from the direct regulatory benefits released by the US SEC and various institutions. Although the progress of strategic Bitcoin reserves in each state is not so smooth, overall, it is still good.

The "Bitcoin Laws" website established by Julian Fahrer shows that 24 states across the United States have proposed strategic Bitcoin reserve bills, with a total of 31 bills. Among them, the Bitcoin reserve bills in Montana, South Dakota, North Dakota, Pennsylvania and Wyoming have been rejected or put on hold. The fastest-progress state is Utah, and the relevant bills have been submitted to the Senate. The second is Arizona. The relevant bill was read out for the third time in the Senate. The vote was 17 votes in favor and 12 votes against.Will be submitted to the House of Representatives for consideration. Other states with relatively high progress include Oklahoma and Texas. (Note: The bill can be proposed in the House of Representatives or the Senate. If it is proposed in the Senate, it will be submitted to the House of Representatives after approval by the Senate, and vice versa. If both houses pass, the bill will be submitted to the governor for signature or will be rejected. Once the governor signs, the bill will become law)

Although the advancement rate of each state is different, the legislative progress of the strategic Bitcoin reserve marks the importance and adoption of cryptocurrencies in local areas. Although I don’t know that Trump’s current preparations for this strategy, it may be more reasonable not to act rushing.

Summary

Although the market is facing severe price fluctuations and panic spreading under the largest hacker crisis in history, it is hoped that the gradual improvement of the regulatory environment can gradually melt the past regulatory "ice" like the warm wind in spring, injecting new vitality into the market. As for the current declining market, the author also recommends that you wait and see first.