Crypto’s Yuletide Wish List: A Jolly Regulatory Jamboree 🎄💰

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With the government shutdown now resolved, the crypto industry has seized the opportunity with the tenacity of a bulldog at a tea party to present its festive regulatory demands to the White House before the year’s end. One might say it’s the season of goodwill-except the goodwill is measured in ether and the demands are as polite as a bear in a top hat.

December, that most pivotal of months, now teeters on the brink of regulatory upheaval under President Trump’s administration, which has shown the kind of crypto-favoring momentum usually reserved for a well-timed snowplow. The air crackles with the scent of staking rewards and legislative ambition.

What The Crypto Industry Wants (And Desperately Needs)

In a letter dated November 20th, the Solana Policy Institute-positioned like a Victorian footman at the front of the queue-has implored the Treasury and IRS to act with the urgency of a man who’s just discovered his socks are on fire. The letter, penned with the gravitas of a Shakespearean soliloquy, insists that Congress’s legislative toil is but a sideshow compared to the Administration’s power to enact swift, decisive changes.

Chief among the industry’s demands? Tax clarity, that most elusive of treasures. They beg for guidance on staking, mining, and airdrops with the fervor of a man begging for a stiff drink after a long day of explaining NFTs to his grandmother. Specifically, they wish to avoid being taxed on unrealized gains, as if the IRS might mistake their crypto for a Christmas goose and demand a second helping.

The Treasury, they argue, should declare staking and mining rewards as property taxed upon disposition-a notion as revolutionary as suggesting turkeys should be allowed to vote on Christmas menus. The letter also implores for no-action relief and safe harbors, terms that sound suspiciously like legal jargon but are, in truth, just a polite way of saying “please don’t arrest us.”

DeFi, that digital asset’s wild cousin, is also in the spotlight. The industry pleads for FinCEN to update its guidance with the zeal of a man updating his LinkedIn profile, and for cybersecurity measures robust enough to repel even the most determined of hackers (or, as some might call them, “overenthusiastic tax auditors”).

And let us not forget the IRS’s role in this yuletide extravaganza. The industry hopes to qualify blockchain activities for R&D tax credits, a move as logical as claiming that building a snowman counts as construction work. One can only imagine the IRS’s response: “But sir, this snowman has a Bitcoin wallet!”

SEC’s Token Safe Harbor Framework: A Model Of Modesty?

The letter also takes a moment to champion the cause of Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm, urging the Department of Justice to drop charges against him with the earnestness of a man pleading with his mother-in-law to stop knitting him sweaters. The signatories argue that open-source software is protected speech, a claim as controversial as suggesting that a Christmas cracker contains both a joke and a lawsuit.

Regulatory sandboxes and safe harbors for DeFi projects are also requested, as if the US government could simply flick a switch and make innovation flourish like mistletoe at a holiday party. The industry cites SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce’s Token Safe Harbor Framework as a model, a reference as subtle as a snowball to the face.

As the Market Structure bill looms on the horizon, all eyes turn to early December’s markup sessions, where the fate of crypto’s regulatory future will be decided with the drama of a Dickensian courtroom scene. One thing is certain: the year-end showdown promises to be more thrilling than a game of Monopoly with a grumpy uncle.

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2025-11-22 15:50