SEC Chairman Paul Atkins Says ‘Crypto’s Time Has Come’

Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Paul Atkins said Wednesday (Sept. 9) that “crypto’s time has come.”

In a speech delivered at the inaugural OECD Roundtable on Global Financial Markets in Paris, Atkins said that while the SEC had set policy by “ad hoc enforcement actions” in the past, it will now provide “clear, predictable rules of the road.”

Atkins pointed to the SEC’s Project Crypto and said one of its priorities is to provide certainty around the security status of crypto assets.

“Most crypto tokens are not securities, and we will draw the lines clearly,” Atkins said in his speech. “We must ensure that entrepreneurs can raise capital on-chain without endless legal uncertainty. And we must allow for ‘super-app’ trading platform innovation that increases choice for market participants.”

Atkins added that there should be a single regulatory umbrella for the trading, lending and staking that may be offered by platforms.

During his speech, Atkins also addressed agentic finance, in which artificial intelligence agents execute trades, allocate capital and manage risk while adhering to securities law compliance.

These systems could deliver “immense” benefits such as faster markets, lower costs and broader access to strategies, Atkins said.

The government’s role in this technology is to maintain “commonsense guardrails” while eliminating “regulatory obstructions,” he said.

“On-chain capital markets and agentic finance are on the horizon, and the world is watching,” Atkins said. “The choice before us is simple yet profound: either America steps forward with confidence and conviction, or others will. I choose leadership, freedom and growth — for our markets, for our economy, and for the next generation.”

Atkins announced the launch of Project Crypto on July 31, saying this SEC-wide initiative aims to modernize securities rules and regulations to enable financial markets in the U.S. to move on-chain.

On Sept. 2, the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission said in a joint statement that SEC- and CFTC-registered exchanges are not prohibited from facilitating the trading of certain spot crypto asset products.

Three days later, on Sept. 5, the two regulators said that they aim to harmonize their regulations to provide markets with clarity and bolster the strength of America’s capital markets .