Senate is making progress on market structure bill, Banking panel head says

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Senate’s stalled crypto market structure bill is making progress behind-the-scenes, the chairman of the body’s Banking Committee said Tuesday.

Senator Tim Scott, who heads the banking panel overseeing the market structure bill, said at the Digital Chamber’s DC Blockchain Summit that lawmakers may see a new draft of at least stablecoin language as soon as this week.

Stablecoin yield has been the most publicly debated issue in the market structure bill, but lawmakers have remained engaged, Scott said.

“I believe that this week we will have the first proposal in my hands to take a look at,” he said. “If that actually happened before the end of this week, and I think that it will, we’ll at least know that the sketch looks like the person. If that’s the case, I think we’re gonna be in much better shape.”

He credited Democratic Senator Angela Alsobrooks, Republican Senator Thom Tillis, and the White House’s Patrick Witt for their efforts on yield.

Other outstanding issues have also been negotiated, particularly over the past month, he said, pointing to concerns lawmakers had about U.S. President Donald Trump and his family’s crypto projects, the lack of bipartisan commissioners at the major regulatory agencies and know-your-customer regulations.

“I think we’re very close to landing the plane on the ethics issue, on quorum,” Scott said. “We know that that’s a big issue for our friends on the other side of the aisle, so we’re fixing that as well. I think we’re moving forward with some [nominations], which is great news that we were able to get some out of the other side. I think the issue of DeFi is something that [Senator] Mark Warner’s held on tightly, AML [anti-money laundering] being a very important part. So I think we’re working on that issue.”