Sponsors (38)
The bill strengthens anti‑corruption and transparency by limiting officials' ability to profit from or hide digital‑asset activity and clarifying coverage, but it expands definitions and disclosure rules in ways that raise compliance costs, privacy concerns, and legal uncertainty for businesses, relatives, and legitimate users.
Federal officials (President, VP, Members of Congress and other covered individuals) and the public: bans and disclosure rules that prevent officials from using their position or intermediaries to profit from or hide digital-asset activity, closing loopholes (beneficial ownership, trusts, nominees) and strengthening enforcement and investor confidence.
Market participants and everyday investors: clearer legal definitions of 'digital asset' and explicit coverage of yield‑bearing products (staking, lending, DeFi) and derivatives reduce regulatory uncertainty and help extend consumer protections and oversight to emerging crypto products.
Taxpayers and the public: the bill specifies who is a 'covered person' (President, VP, Members of Congress and close relatives), clarifying who must follow the prohibitions and disclosures and reducing ambiguity about enforcement scope.
Crypto firms, financial institutions, small businesses and consumers: broad, detailed definitions and expanded coverage will increase compliance costs for firms, raise administrative burdens, and likely pass higher costs to customers and slow some market activity.
Small businesses, nonprofits and ordinary users of digital wallets/protocols: expanded beneficial-ownership and indirect-holdings rules increase reporting burdens and could sweep in passive investors, while new disclosure requirements raise privacy concerns for legitimate users.
Covered individuals (federal employees): prohibition on certain digital-asset investments plus criminal penalties create personal financial limits and legal/reputational risk if rules are misinterpreted, potentially discouraging applicants and exposing officials to prosecution risk.
Based on analysis of 4 sections of legislative text.
Bars the President, Vice President, Members of Congress, and certain relatives from owning, issuing, promoting, trading, or receiving pay tied to a broad range of digital assets, including indirect holdings, with criminal penalties.
Official title: To establish certain digital asset prohibitions with respect to elected Government officials, and for other purposes.
Introduced May 21, 2025 by Maxine Waters · Last progress May 21, 2025
Prohibits the President, Vice President, Members of Congress, and certain close relatives from owning, controlling, issuing, promoting, receiving compensation from, or trading digital assets in ways that create conflicts of interest or use material nonpublic information. The bill defines broad categories of digital assets (including stablecoins, memecoins, NFTs, DeFi products, and derivatives) and extends the prohibitions to indirect ownership, control, and use of intermediaries, with criminal penalties for violations. The measure also bars SEC-reporting issuers from transacting in digital assets on behalf of covered individuals and includes detailed definitions of ‘‘covered individual,’’ ‘‘digital asset,’’ ‘‘distributed ledger,’’ and ‘‘beneficial owner’’ to prevent circumvention through trusts, nominees, wallets, protocols, or other arrangements.