New guidance from the United States Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has established a formal taxonomy for digital assets, drawing a sharp line between the current regulatory approach and that of the previous administration. Alex Thorn, head of firmwide research at investment firm Galaxy, described the move as the final nail in the coffin of crypto policy under former SEC Chairman Gary Gensler. The guidance was published on Tuesday and organizes digital assets into five distinct categories.
Those five categories include digital commodities, digital collectibles such as non-fungible tokens, digital tools, stablecoins, and tokenized securities. The framework represents a significant departure from how the SEC previously approached crypto regulation. Under the Gensler-era framework, rules determining which cryptocurrencies qualified as investment contracts were issued as legislative rules, carrying the full force of law.
By contrast, the new 2026 guidance was filed as an interpretive rule, a distinction Thorn highlighted as particularly meaningful. An interpretive rule is exempt from notice-and-comment requirements, does not carry the force of law, and serves only to explain how the agency understands existing statutory provisions. This means courts are not legally bound to enforce the policies outlined in the guidance, providing both the SEC and the broader crypto industry with greater flexibility to adapt as the regulatory landscape evolves.
Thorn noted that the new approach offers the crypto sector much-needed clarity over the next 30 months. However, he cautioned that the CLARITY crypto market structure bill must be formally codified into law to establish durable rules over the coming decades. Without legislative action, the current interpretive framework remains subject to change under future administrations or agency leadership.
The CLARITY Act has faced a difficult path in Congress. The bill stalled in January 2025 after crypto exchange Coinbase and other industry participants raised concerns about a prohibition on stablecoin yield and insufficient protections for open-source software developers. Additional friction arose from provisions that critics argued would effectively dismantle the decentralized finance sector by imposing reporting requirements and know-your-customer controls on DeFi platforms.
Despite those obstacles, a report published by Politico on Friday indicated that a tentative deal between the White House and lawmakers may be moving the CLARITY bill forward. Specific terms of the prospective agreement have not been fully disclosed. Senator Angela Alsoboorks stated that the tentative deal includes a ban on stablecoin yield derived from passive balances, though further details remain pending.
Originally reported by CoinTelegraph.
