Overview
- The Securities and Exchange Commission has published a formal proposed rule that sets clear standards for who may hold client crypto and how advisers and funds must safeguard those assets.
- The proposal allows limited self‑custody under defined conditions and would permit qualified state‑chartered trust companies to act as custodians for client crypto holdings.
- New requirements in the text sharpen recordkeeping, federal disclosure and independent auditing expectations for investment advisers, regulated funds and their custodians.
- The rule is open to public comment for 60 days as the next procedural step before any final vote, and industry participants are expected to focus comments on custodian qualification, segregation and audit standards.
- The proposal advances Chairman Paul Atkins’s digital‑asset agenda and was released just before Commissioner Hester Peirce’s departure, leaving the SEC with two commissioners and shifting the agency’s political dynamics around final adoption.