SEC gives up on Crypto Assets! 2026 agenda completely removed to focus on AI and cybersecurity

The SEC's priorities for 2026 completely removed content related to Crypto Assets, indicating its intention to shift focus to broader technology and Compliance risks. The 17-page “2026 Examination Priorities” released by the examination department outlines key areas for investment advisers, funds, broker-dealers, and market utilities, reiterating cross-disciplinary efforts in information security, operational resilience, identification theft, revised SP regulations, and AML.

A Historic Turning Point from Key Regulation to Complete Disappearance

(Source: SEC)

SEC reviewers will not regard Crypto Assets as an independent risk in the FY 2026 priorities, marking a significant change in the agency's approach in 2024 and 2025. A simple before-and-after comparison of the written priorities reveals the severity of this shift.

According to the SEC's 2024 priorities, the section on “Crypto Assets and Emerging Financial Technologies” specifically points out that the review will prioritize companies active in crypto assets and related products. The 2025 priorities again list crypto assets alongside artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and AML as key risk areas, with a summary from law firms emphasizing the need to continuously focus on law firms providing crypto-related services. However, the 2026 document completely removed this content, although other technological topics have been expanded.

SEC Priorities Comparison Table

This kind of drastic change is extremely rare in the history of the SEC. Typically, adjustments in regulatory focus are gradual, where a certain area shifts from “priority” to “secondary” rather than disappearing entirely. The 180-degree turn in the SEC's Crypto Assets policy indicates that this is not a natural evolution, but a deliberate policy choice. In the section regarding emerging financial technologies, the document focuses on automated recommendations, algorithms, and artificial intelligence, including whether tools can generate compliance recommendations, but completely omits any mention of Crypto Assets.

Policy Revolution Promoted by the White House and the New Chairman

The policy and personnel background help explain the timing. According to a summary of the January order by Pillsbury Law, the White House shifted its stance in early 2025, issuing directives to support the responsible growth and use of digital assets, limiting federal government research on central bank digital currencies, and establishing a presidential working group on digital asset markets. A March situation brief from the White House emphasized the establishment of a strategic Bitcoin reserve and a U.S. digital asset reserve, positioning cryptocurrencies as strategic assets rather than speculative markets.

According to legal commentary from the SEC and Armstrong Teasdale law firm, Paul S. Atkins was sworn in as chairman in April 2025, advocating for a more relaxed regulatory approach and emphasizing capital formation. This stands in stark contrast to the hardline regulatory stance of former chairman Gary Gensler. During his tenure, Gensler viewed most crypto assets as unregistered securities and initiated lawsuits against major exchanges like Coinbase, Ripple, and Binance, receiving criticism from the industry for “stifling innovation.”

According to the Financial Times, Meg Ryan was appointed as the enforcement director in September, a move interpreted by some as a signal of a shift in enforcement stance. The enforcement intensity has gradually moved away from the peak during the Gensler era. Cornerstone Research statistics show that in 2023, there were 46 enforcement actions related to crypto assets with the SEC, setting a historical high; while in 2024, there were 33, a decrease of about 30% year-on-year.

According to the SEC's enforcement results for the fiscal year 2024, the agency took a total of 583 enforcement actions in the fiscal year 2024, a decrease from the previous year; while the total fines reached a record $8.2 billion, primarily due to the impact of the settlement with Terraform Labs. Compared to the past where new lawsuits were frequently filed, the structure of enforcement cases this year has changed, with more cases targeting early violations that carry higher fines.

Closure of Legacy Cases and Adjustment of Law Enforcement Direction

Under the leadership of the new chairman, some legacy issues have been narrowed down or resolved. The SEC concluded its long-term investigation of Ripple, imposing a fine of $125 million and issuing a ban limited to institutional sales. The SEC also concluded its investigation of Robinhood's Crypto Assets business with no charges brought. According to reports from Investopedia, the SEC has withdrawn its lawsuit against Coinbase, which accused Coinbase of engaging in unregistered trading activities and staking products.

Along with the priorities for 2026, these results indicate that reviews and enforcement will be adjusted to take a narrower stance, focusing on fraud, custody, marketing, Money Laundering, and operational risks, through technology-neutral rules, rather than treating tokens as a separate regulatory channel. This “technology-neutral” approach means that the SEC will regard Crypto Assets as regulatory subjects similar to other complex financial products, rather than as outliers needing special treatment.

In July 2025, the global market value of Crypto Assets surpassed 4 trillion USD. At the same time, net inflows into the US spot Bitcoin ETF in 2024 were around 35.7 billion USD, with funding continuing to flow for most of 2025. Today, the investor group for SEC-related Crypto Assets products includes large asset management companies, broker-dealers, and pension pipelines, all of which fall under the SEC's regulatory scope. However, the new regulatory focus will shift the review direction towards artificial intelligence risks, data security and privacy governance, Regulation SP event responses, and identification theft control, rather than reviewing the Crypto Assets themselves.

The market conditions have exacerbated this tension. The price of Bitcoin has fallen below $90,000, down nearly 30% from its peak of over $126,000 in October, while Ethereum's trading price is below $3,000. The entire crypto assets market has seen its market value evaporate by about $1 trillion in six weeks. This extreme volatility may test the custody arrangements, liquidity management, and marketing appropriateness in regulated pipelines. The examination project aims to address these risks through unrelated perspectives, such as complex product regulation, cybersecurity, and AML, rather than simply labeling it as “crypto assets.”

Global Regulatory Discrepancies and Three Possible Paths

Outside of the United States, regulatory agencies are moving towards developing industry-specific rules. The European Union's Crypto Assets Market Framework (MiCA) is now fully in effect. According to data from the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), stablecoin regulations will take effect on June 30, 2024, while the broader regulatory framework for crypto asset service providers will apply starting December 30, 2024.

According to Stablecoin Insider, non-compliant stablecoins will be delisted by March 31, 2025. Analysts predict that the Eurozone stablecoin market will reach a considerable level by the end of the year. The UK has released a draft statutory instrument aimed at creating new regulatory activities for Crypto Assets and is consulting on issues such as trading platforms, intermediary services, staking, and decentralized finance (DeFi), while also considering strengthening consumer risk management.

Hong Kong continues to improve the licensing system for virtual asset trading platforms and announced the “ASPI-Re” roadmap in 2025, which includes 12 measures, among which is the measure allowing licensed platforms to share global order books with affiliated companies to enhance liquidity. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) finalized the stablecoin framework in 2023, which will take effect in 2024 and applies to single-currency stablecoins pegged to the Singapore Dollar or G10 currencies.

This divergence establishes three possible development paths for 2026 to 2027. The baseline outcome is benign neglect, meaning the SEC excludes Crypto Assets from its review focus and addresses the risks associated with Crypto Assets through custody, AML, cybersecurity, and marketing rules, while law enforcement activities gradually shift to a single-digit number of cases, mainly focusing on fraud.

The results of the readjustment require Congress to take action to change the market structure, pushing most spot coins toward the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and reserving the SEC for tokenized securities and fund shares. After that, the review plan can reintroduce a narrow scope of cryptocurrency limited to securities products.

If a major failure occurs, such as a stablecoin collapse, an exchange incident, or a product-level impact within the ETF system, it could result in a rapid rebound, potentially triggering hearings and bringing Crypto Assets back into the priorities for 2027 or 2028, along with the introduction of new professional resources.

New Regulatory Realities Faced by Different Participants

For centralized exchanges and broker-dealer hybrid exchanges, recent review focuses on AML, custody, and the suitability of complex products, as well as CFTC regulation of derivatives. Although several large exchanges in the United States no longer face direct litigation threats from the SEC, they still need to ensure that their custody processes, anti-money laundering procedures, and product disclosures comply with general regulatory standards.

For DeFi, the SEC's oversight further indicates that on-chain regulation is not on its recent review agenda, while the processes in the EU, UK, and Hong Kong may become the first source of binding standards. The regulatory vacuum for decentralized finance protocols may persist for a longer time, providing space for innovation but also bringing uncertainty.

For stablecoin issuers, the MiCA and MAS frameworks are rapidly becoming reference standards for design and compliance, and this is no exception for U.S. market participants operating globally. Stablecoin issuers like Circle and Paxos may find that adhering to the standards of the EU and Singapore offers more certainty than waiting for U.S. congressional legislation.

For ETF sponsors and asset management companies, regardless of the underlying index, the focus on complex packaging, information disclosure, best interest obligations, and operational flexibility remains unchanged. Asset management giants like BlackRock and Fidelity, which have launched Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs, still need to ensure that these products comply with the SEC's general requirements for all ETFs, but will not face additional scrutiny simply because the underlying assets are Crypto Assets.

Ultimately, the SEC's silence may be more persuasive than its past aggressive actions, as this shift highlights its move from instinctive hostility to thoughtful restraint. For years, silence often preceded the issuance of subpoenas, and now this new stance indicates that things have become simpler: Crypto Assets are no longer a special project for the SEC.

Whether this ultimately proves to be a delayed normalization or a temporary stagnation, the focus of U.S. regulation is shifting, and this time, it is not because the SEC has concealed anything, but because it is finally stepping out of the public eye. This historic turning point in SEC cryptocurrency regulation may mark the U.S. crypto industry's transition from “regulatory resistance” to a new phase of “self-development.”