The Hyperliquid Policy Center (HPC) praised Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chair Paul Atkins on Friday for what it described as an ambitious effort to improve clarity for on-chain markets.
SEC’s On-Chain Guidance Agenda
Atkins’ remarks centered on four key areas where he said the Commission should provide more guidance on how regulatory principles translate into the context of on-chain activity. He said that participants should have a clear sense of how on-chain trading systems can function within the regulatory perimeter.
Looking ahead, he noted that while the SEC may consider a limited “innovation pathway” soon, he also argued the agency should think about what a future-proof framework could look like.
In his view, that framework would take the form of notice-and-comment rulemaking, and it would specifically address how the SEC’s “exchange” definition applies to on-chain trading systems.
The SEC chair also pointed to the need to clarify how the broker and dealer framework would apply to these activities. He said the Commission should examine issues raised in a recent staff statement on software interfaces, and he suggested that this policy initiative could involve notice-and-comment exemptive rulemaking.
A third area of emphasis was the definition of a “clearing agency” as it applies to on-chain clearing and settlement. Atkins said rulemaking may be necessary to confirm which general-purpose activities fall outside that definition.
Finally, Atkins called for additional clarity surrounding what are commonly referred to as “crypto vaults.” He described crypto vaults as on-chain software applications that allow users to earn yield passively by deploying their assets into yield-generating opportunities on-chain.
He said the Commission should address the relevant Securities Act and Advisers Act touch-points as it considers these policy initiatives.
Why Hyperliquid Policy Center Finds It Promising
Atkins concluded by saying the SEC will keep moving forward to accommodate markets moving on-chain. At the same time, he reiterated his call for Congress to send the CLARITY Act to President Trump’s desk.
He argued that while the SEC intends to “future-proof” its efforts through notice-and-comment rulemaking, there is “no more powerful” future-proofing mechanism than enshrining well-designed statutory language in law.
The Hyperliquid Policy Center, led by Jake Chervinsky, said it was encouraged by Atkins’ approach of mapping on-chain clearing and settlement systems to existing legal frameworks “on their own terms,” rather than forcing them into legacy categories built for legacy architecture.
The Hyperliquid Policy Center also called on-chain clearing and settlement “one of the most significant financial infrastructure innovations of our generation,” and it said it views the chairman’s stance as a constructive step toward regulatory alignment as on-chain systems continue to evolve.
At the time of writing, the Hyperliquid platform’s native token, HYPE, was trading at $42.98, marking a 2% increase over the last 24 hours. Currently, the Hyperliquid token is trading at almost 27% below its all-time high of $59, which was reached last year.
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