Author: Will A Wang
On June 9, 2025, at a roundtable conference themed "DeFi and the Spirit", newly appointed SEC Chairman Paul S. Atkins delivered an extremely positive speech about decentralized finance (DeFi), laying the groundwork for subsequent SEC's friendly regulation of DeFi.
A tweet by Uniswap founder Adams, who devastwas previously devastated by litigation under the previous chairman Gary Genseler,
DeFi has developed so incredibly fast. In 2018, the launch of MakerDAO + Compoundsw+ Uniswap felt like the true beginning of the DeFi movement. Before that, the term "DeFi" didn't even exist. Now, 7 years later, government agencies are publicly acknowledging it as a national priority!
(https://x.com/haydenzadams/status/1932298054343733664)
Similarly, the crypto market responded positively, with veteran DeFi platforms like Aave, UNI, MKR,, comp value surge. Since these veteran DeFi platforms are built on ETH, thus ETH also rose accordingly. For these relatively decentralized DeFi protocols, this represents both a value return and, more importantly, their ability to come ashore.
Therefore, this article first compiles the DeFi speech content, then glimpses the emerging US crypto regulation (not just DeFi), and finally looks at future crypto trends - On-Chain Financial Markets.
(Translation continues in the same manner for the rest of the text)If the assets traded on the platform involve "securities," the platform will be deemed to be involved in unregistered securities sales and brokerage business. A typical case is the SEC's lawsuit against the self-custodial wallet Metamask, arguing that some of its services, such as staking and brokerage trading, fall under "securities" transactions.
Under such a regulatory logic, a very strict "securities" identification is needed, which challenges not only the U.S. Securities Act of 1933 but also existing judicial legislative procedures. Therefore, due to the lack of clear definition and regulatory framework for crypto assets, the SEC at that time mostly adopted an enforcement-based regulatory approach, initiating a war against crypto projects like Coinbase, Metamask, and Uniswap.
2.2 SEC Regulatory Approach during Paul S. Atkins' Period
During this Trump administration, led by Paul S. Atkins, the essential goal has changed, "It is a new day at the SEC".
Both in this speech and the previous speech on May 12th about "Asset Tokenization - The Intersection of Traditional Finance and DeFi," a signal was released:
To realize President Trump's vision of making the United States the "global cryptocurrency capital" by encouraging developers, entrepreneurs, and other companies willing to comply with certain conditions to innovate blockchain technology in the U.S., making America the best place to participate in the crypto asset market.
Through Paul S. Atkins' two speeches, an SEC regulatory approach was provided:
For real-world asset tokenization (RWA Tokenization):
- Develop a reasonable regulatory framework for the crypto asset market;
- Issuance: Adopt a more flexible crypto asset issuance method, rather than strictly applying traditional securities issuance methods;
- Custody: Support providing more autonomy for registered institutions in crypto asset custody;
- Trading: Support launching more types of trading products based on market demand, breaking previous SEC restrictions on such trading activities.
Create more flexible conditional exemption measures to promote blockchain innovation returning to the U.S., MAGA.
For Decentralized Finance (DeFi):
- Redefine blockchain network node operation Staking business to promote healthy blockchain network development and attract nodes;
- Provide flexibility for asset self-custody, in line with the American spirit;
- Clarify the responsibility of self-executing software code;
- Provide clear regulatory guidance for building on-chain financial markets;
- Construct conditional exemption framework & innovation exemption framework to encourage innovation.
2.3 Initial Outline of U.S. Crypto Regulation
Thus, a basic crypto regulatory outline has formed:
- Led by banking regulatory agencies, regulation of "payment stablecoins", Genuis Act;
- CFTC regulates crypto assets;
- SEC regulates DeFi activities;
- SEC regulates tokenized assets.
- FinCEN, OFAC, etc., for KYC/AML/CTF and economic sanctions.
Three, What Will Happen in the Future?
After basically clarifying the U.S. regulatory framework, we can glimpse a bit of future trends:
Established DeFi, having experienced ups and downs, can now officially come ashore.
Innovative DeFi can also develop rapidly in the U.S. under the "innovation exemption", especially financial products like yield-bearing stablecoins. These differ from the "payment stablecoins" defined in the Genuis Act; although called stablecoins, they are actually financial products built using stablecoins.
The composability of this relatively decentralized DeFi can, with more stablecoins and tokenized assets going on-chain, combine into more diverse financial products.
More Web2 traditional fintech companies will combine and innovate with Web3 DeFi.
Following this will be on-chain financial markets.
This market is global, democratizes investment, has low barriers, low costs, global reach, and is supported by global liquidity - an internet-based market. Importantly, the internet has network effects.
But based on the regulatory framework, the underlying foundation is USD stablecoins, USD, and U.S. Treasury bonds.
