SEC Chairman Clarifies: BTC and ETH Do Not Fall Under Securities Category

On March 18, at the DC Blockchain Summit 2026, SEC Chairman Paul Atkins announced a new framework for the classification of tokens and the interpretation of investment contracts, sending a very clear regulatory signal: Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) are explicitly categorized as non-security assets.

According to this new framework, the SEC has explicitly exempted four types of non-security digital assets, including:

1. Digital commodities: such as BTC, ETH

2. Digital collectibles

3. Digital tools

4. Payment stablecoins under the "GENIUS Act" framework

Meanwhile, the SEC has also drawn a clearer boundary:

The entities that are truly subject to U.S. securities law will mainly be "digital securities," which are tokenized forms of traditional securities.

Paul Atkins also emphasized that the SEC is no longer the "committee that regulates everything." The meaning of this statement is very straightforward: in the future, the SEC's regulatory focus will no longer attempt to categorize all crypto assets under securities logic, but will instead conduct more precise classification management based on asset attributes.

This is a very critical change for the entire crypto industry.

On one hand, the regulatory positioning of BTC and ETH is further clarified, which helps to enhance market expectation stability;

On the other hand, this also means that the future focus of industry disputes may gradually shift from "whether it is a security" to "which category of assets it belongs to and which set of rules applies."

If this framework is continuously implemented, the narrative of regulation in the crypto market may officially shift from "comprehensive enforcement" to "categorical governance." #加密货币 #监管框架 #SEC