The US Senate Banking Committee is reportedly set to create its first-ever crypto subcommittee, while a pro-crypto commissioner is now a top pick to replace the outgoing chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, according to two reports.
The two reports — seen as positive developments for the crypto industry — come less than two weeks before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, set for Jan. 20.
According to a report from FOX Business on Jan. 9, following a Punchbowl News report on Jan. 8, the US Senate Banking Committee’s new chair, Republican Senator Tim Scott, has made the creation of the subcommittee a top priority and plans to replicate the House Financial Services Committee’s model, which introduced a crypto subcommittee in 2023.
Two Senate aides told FOX that Scott has put forward Senator Cynthia Lummis to chair the subcommittee, with a vote on her approval to happen in the next few days. Lummis, a longtime crypto supporter, has recently echoed Trump’s push for a strategic Bitcoin BTC$94,675 reserve.
Trump has made sweeping promises to rein in crypto regulation by enforcement and turn the US into a “crypto capital.” The Senate Banking Committee is the key overseer of financial agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission and of federal monetary policy.
A memo seen by FOX said Senators Bernie Moreno, Dave McCormick, Thom Tillis and Bill Hagerty were being considered for the new crypto subcommittee. They are all “strongly supportive” of crypto, according to the digital assets lobby group Stand With Crypto.
It is not known which Democrats might be joining the subcommittee, but Senator Elizabeth Warren, a vocal crypto skeptic, is the party’s most senior member of the Senate Banking Committee.
In 2024, the House passed a key crypto bill known as FIT21 that was created by the House Financial Services crypto subcommittee. It would hand greater regulatory control to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. The bill is currently awaiting action in the Senate.
Mersinger tipped to lead CFTC
Meanwhile, Unchained reported on Jan. 9 that five people close to the matter said CFTC Commissioner Summer Mersinger has emerged as a leading choice to chair the agency, as current CFTC chair Rostin Behnam said he’d be stepping down when Trump takes office.
Mersinger has overtaken ex-CFTC commissioner and a16z policy head Brian Quintenz for the job, as she’s seen as someone who could pass a Senate confirmation. She was a staffer for Senate Majority Leader John Thune for 12 years.
As she’s already a commissioner, Trump could appoint her to a temporary chair role while the Senate deliberates on her confirmation.
Mersinger has made crypto-supportive comments, telling a Blockchain conference in November that she was “uncomfortable” that the CFTC was “kind of setting some sort of policy through our enforcement cases.”
Trump is set to take office on Jan. 20, officially giving Republicans full control of the government after the party picked up a majority of Senate seats and kept its House majority in November’s elections. The new Congress kicked off on Jan. 3.
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