United States of America: Introduced Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act (HR 4763)

On 20 July 2023, the Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act (HR 4763) was introduced in the United States House of Representatives. The Act defines digital assets as “any fungible digital representation of value that can be exclusively possessed and transferred, person to person, without necessary reliance on an intermediary, and is recorded on a cryptographically secured public distributed ledger” and outlines disclosure requirements, including risks, source code, project economics, development plan, related and affiliated persons. Furthermore, the Act outlines criteria that digital assets have to meet to be considered a digital commodity and be exempt from the disclosure requirements. The Act would require providers of digital assets to register with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and outlines exemptions from the registration obligation. Finally, the Act would require digital commodity brokers and dealers to register to operate and comply with business conduct requirements.