Regulatory update: Stablecoin net capital, WisdomTree relief, CFTC innovation advisory committee

a16z crypto Regulatory Team
Share

Tags

Editor’s note: Our Regulatory Updates series highlights the latest regulatory, legal, and policy happenings relevant to the crypto industry, curated by the a16z crypto regulatory team.

Regulatory Update: February 3 – February 24, 2026

tl;dr

  • The staff of the Division of Trading and Markets issued an FAQ relating to the treatment of payment stablecoins under the broker-dealer net capital rule. The FAQ provides that the staff would not object if a broker-dealer were to apply a 2% haircut on proprietary positions in a payment stablecoin when calculating its net capital. Commissioner Hester Peirce released a statement in connection with the FAQ.
  • The Division of Investment Management issued an exemptive order for WisdomTree Treasury Money Market Digital Fund to permit investors to trade the MMF’s shares at $1 with a dealer on an intraday basis, regardless of its end-of-day NAV.
  • The CFTC announced its new 35-member Innovation Advisory Committee.

🌽 Commodity Futures Trading Commission

  • As mentioned in “tl;dr,” the CFTC announced its new 35-member Innovation Advisory Committee.
  • The CFTC filed an amicus brief in the Ninth Circuit arguing that event contracts traded on CFTC-regulated markets fall within its exclusive jurisdiction and that the Commodity Exchange Act preempts other federal and state regulators from asserting authority over such swaps.
  • The CFTC’s Market Participants Division announced that it has reissued CFTC Staff Letter 25-40 with a limited revision to the definition of “payment stablecoin,” which specifies that a national trust bank may be a permitted issuer of a payment stablecoin for purposes of the no-action position.
  • The CFTC withdrew a 2024 notice of proposed rulemaking that would have prohibited political and sports-related event contracts and stated that it does not intend to issue final rules with respect to the proposal. The CFTC also withdrew a 2025 staff advisory that had cautioned registrants about offering sports-related event contracts due to ongoing litigation.

🦅 Congress

  • Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) wrote to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell requesting written confirmation that the Treasury and the Federal Reserve will not “use taxpayer dollars to bail out cryptocurrency billionaires and other highly leveraged cryptocurrency investors.”
  • Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Andy Kim (D-N.J.) wrote to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent asking him to confirm that CFIUS will examine a reported transaction between a foreign investment vehicle and World Liberty Financial. House Representative Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) and others also wrote to Secretary Bessent calling on the Secretary to investigate World Liberty Financial. 
  • Senators Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Adam Schiff (D-Cal.), and others wrote to CFTC Chair Michael Selig urging him to abstain from intervening in pending litigation involving prediction markets.

⚖ Department of Justice

  • Crypto trading platform Paxful Holdings was sentenced to pay a criminal penalty of $4 million following its guilty plea to conspiracy to promote illegal prostitution, violate the Bank Secrecy Act, and knowingly transmit funds derived from criminal offenses.
  • A dual national of China and St. Kitts and Nevis was sentenced in absentia to 20 years in prison and three years of supervised release for his role in an international cryptocurrency investment conspiracy carried out from scam centers in Cambodia.
  • The CEO of Praetorian Group International was sentenced to 20 years in prison following his conviction on wire fraud and money laundering charges for operating a Ponzi scheme that made false statements regarding its bitcoin trading activity.
  • The founder of Incognito Market was sentenced to 30 years in prison in connection with his ownership and operation of the market. The marketplace processed more than $100 million in illicit drug sales using cryptocurrency.
  • The CEO of SafeMoon US was sentenced to 100 months in prison for conspiracy to commit securities fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering in connection with a scheme to defraud investors in a digital asset called “SafeMoon.”
  • A Washington state man pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering for a scheme in which he took in fraud proceeds from investors who thought they were investing in the oil and gas industry and instead moved the funds through accounts and cryptocurrency wallets.
  • A New England man was charged in a 21-count indictment related to an alleged cryptocurrency fraud scheme.
  • The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Ohio issued a warning to the public to remain vigilant against romance scams.
  • SDNY U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said that he anticipates prosecutions in the prediction markets space, and he discussed digital assets at the Securities Enforcement Forum New York.

💵 Department of the Treasury

  • Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent discussed the FSOC’s 2025 annual report before the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, and he answered questions about U.S. leadership in crypto and stablecoins, as well as digital asset market structure legislation.
  • OFAC designated a Russian national and others for their acquisition and distribution of cyber tools harmful to U.S. national security. His company previously purchased proprietary cyber tools that had been stolen from a U.S. company for millions of dollars paid in cryptocurrencies.

💰 Federal Reserve

  • Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller discussed digital assets and their place in the U.S. payment system, the regulatory environment for stablecoins, and other issues at the Global Interdependence Center.
  • Federal Reserve Governor Neel Kashkari discussed payment innovation at the Midwest Economic Outlook Summit, and he called crypto “utterly useless” and dismissed the benefits of stablecoins.
  • The Federal Reserve published a staff paper titled, “Initial Margin for Crypto Currencies Risks in Uncleared Markets.”
  • The Federal Reserve published a staff paper titled, “Kalshi and the Rise of Macro Markets.”

🛒 Federal Trade Commission

  • The FTC issued a second report to Congress detailing the agency’s efforts to fight against ransomware and other cyberattacks.

💵 Office of the Comptroller of the Currency

  • Stripe-owned stablecoin platform Bridge announced that it has received conditional approval from the OCC to organize a federally chartered national trust bank. Crypto.com also announced that it received conditional approval for a national trust bank.

📈 Securities and Exchange Commission

  • As mentioned in “tl;dr,” the staff of the Division of Trading and Markets issued an FAQ relating to the treatment of payment stablecoins under the broker-dealer net capital rule. The FAQ provides that the staff would not object if a broker-dealer were to apply a 2% haircut on proprietary positions in a payment stablecoin when calculating its net capital. Commissioner Hester Peirce released a statement in connection with the FAQ.
  • As mentioned in “tl;dr,” the Division of Investment Management issued an exemptive order for WisdomTree Treasury Money Market Digital Fund to permit investors to trade the MMF’s shares at $1 with a dealer on an intraday basis, regardless of its end-of-day NAV.
  • SEC Chair Paul Atkins and Commissioner Hester Peirce discussed crypto-related issues that the Commission plans to consider soon, including an innovation exemption to facilitate limited trading of certain tokenized securities on novel platforms, as well as no-action letters and exemptive orders to provide additional clarity for wallets and other user interfaces not subject to registration under the Exchange Act.
  • SEC Chair Paul Atkins said that “there is no action [the SEC] can take that future-proofs our rulebook more formidably than nonpartisan market structure” in testimony before the U.S. Senate Banking Committee.
  • SEC Chair Paul Atkins discussed Project Crypto at the AFME’s Annual Financial Services Policy Dinner and said that regulators should refrain from forcing on-chain innovations to comply with legacy market rules that are not fit-for-purpose.
  • SEC Commissioner Mark Uyeda discussed the current status of the SEC’s efforts to implement the Treasury Clearing Rule and facilitate tokenization of the securities markets at the Asset Management Derivatives Forum 2026.
  • SEC Division of Corporation Finance Director James Moloney said that the Division is preparing interpretive guidance that provides a taxonomy for crypto assets and describes a framework for determining when crypto assets are subject to an investment contract. 

State

🦞 Massachusetts

  • The Massachusetts Attorney General filed a lawsuit against cryptocurrency kiosk operator Bitcoin Depot for allegedly using misleading and deceptive sales tactics to overcharge consumers, knowingly facilitating crypto scams, refusing to issue refunds to scam victims, and deceiving investors.

🐂 Texas

  • The Texas State Securities Board issued an emergency cease-and-desist order against TEXITcoin, MineTXC, Blockchain Mint, and their founder for alleged violations of the Texas Securities Act related to the fraudulent offer and sale of cryptocurrency mining investments to Texas residents.

International

🇪🇺 European Union

  • The European Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs issued a draft report “on digital assets – challenges for the competitiveness and integrity of the European Union’s financial system.”
  • The ESMA issued a statement reminding firms of their obligation to assess whether newly offered products, including products marketed as perpetual futures or perpetual contracts, fall within the scope of existing product intervention measures on contracts for differences.
  • The EBA published an opinion advising national authorities under the Payment Services Directive 2 on how to proceed once the transition period that is set in the EBA’s previous no-action letter comes to an end.

🇭🇰 Hong Kong

  • Hong Kong Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po discussed global trends relating to crypto, as well as Hong Kong’s approach to and latest initiatives on crypto, at CoinDesk’s Consensus Hong Kong conference.
  • Hong Kong’s SFC issued new guidance to extend virtual asset (VA) services to margin financing for licensed brokers providing VA dealing services, and to set out a high-level framework to guide virtual asset trading platforms in developing proposals for VA‑related leveraged products intended for professional investors.

🇬🇧 United Kingdom

The FCA announced that it has begun “legal proceedings against global crypto exchange HTX (formerly Huobi) for illegally promoting cryptoasset services to UK consumers.”

***

The views expressed here are those of the individual AH Capital Management, L.L.C. (“a16z”) personnel quoted and are not the views of a16z or its affiliates. Certain information contained in here has been obtained from third-party sources, including from portfolio companies of funds managed by a16z. While taken from sources believed to be reliable, a16z has not independently verified such information and makes no representations about the current or enduring accuracy of the information or its appropriateness for a given situation. In addition, this content may include third-party advertisements; a16z has not reviewed such advertisements and does not endorse any advertising content contained therein.

This content is provided for informational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as legal, business, investment, or tax advice. You should consult your own advisers as to those matters. References to any securities or digital assets are for illustrative purposes only, and do not constitute an investment recommendation or offer to provide investment advisory services. Furthermore, this content is not directed at nor intended for use by any investors or prospective investors, and may not under any circumstances be relied upon when making a decision to invest in any fund managed by a16z. (An offering to invest in an a16z fund will be made only by the private placement memorandum, subscription agreement, and other relevant documentation of any such fund and should be read in their entirety.) Any investments or portfolio companies mentioned, referred to, or described are not representative of all investments in vehicles managed by a16z, and there can be no assurance that the investments will be profitable or that other investments made in the future will have similar characteristics or results. A list of investments made by funds managed by Andreessen Horowitz (excluding investments for which the issuer has not provided permission for a16z to disclose publicly as well as unannounced investments in publicly traded digital assets) is available at https://a16z.com/investments/.

The content speaks only as of the date indicated. Any projections, estimates, forecasts, targets, prospects, and/or opinions expressed in these materials are subject to change without notice and may differ or be contrary to opinions expressed by others. Please see https://a16z.com/disclosures for additional important information.