One Year Since Atkins Took Charge of the SEC: Relaxed Enforcement, Accelerated ETF Approvals, Ongoing Controversies

Author: Turner Wright

Original translation: Deep Tide TechFlow

Introduction: On April 21, 2025, Paul Atkins was sworn in as SEC Chairman, exactly one year ago. During this year, the SEC has withdrawn multiple lawsuits against crypto companies, approved several crypto ETFs, and signed a memorandum of understanding on digital asset regulation coordination with the CFTC. However, Democratic lawmakers’ allegations of conflicts of interest against Atkins have also intensified, and the SEC is still awaiting Congress to pass the Market Structure Act to clarify its jurisdiction over digital assets.

On April 21, 2025, Paul Atkins was sworn in as Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Today marks exactly one year.

In this year, the SEC has undergone a fundamental shift in its regulatory and enforcement stance on digital assets, contrasting sharply with the approach during former Chairman Gary Gensler’s tenure.

During the 2024 election, Trump made several promises to the crypto industry: replacing Gensler, establishing a national Bitcoin (BTC) reserve, and opposing the issuance of a U.S. central bank digital currency. After winning the November 2024 election, Gensler resigned in January 2025, and SEC Commissioner Mark Uyeda temporarily served as acting chair until the Senate confirmed Atkins’s nomination.

Caption: SEC Chairman Paul Atkins interviewed on CNBC Squawk Box on April 20, 2026

Source: CNBC

Before Atkins even took office, the SEC was already shifting its stance

Before officially assuming office, Atkins’s appointment, the SEC began signaling a change. During Uyeda’s interim period, the SEC established a crypto working group led by Commissioner Hester Peirce, and from February 2025 onward, it gradually withdrew civil enforcement actions and investigations against crypto companies, with Coinbase being the first.

In the 12 months since Atkins officially took office, the SEC has introduced a series of policies widely regarded by the industry as favorable:

• Ending multiple enforcement actions against crypto companies
• Approving several exchange-traded funds (ETFs) linked to various crypto assets
• Signing a memorandum of understanding on digital asset regulation coordination with the CFTC
• Issuing interpretive notices clarifying that most cryptocurrencies do not constitute securities under federal law

In an interview with CNBC on April 21, Atkins said: “The year has gone by quickly, but I think we’ve made great progress. When I took office, I promised the SEC a new day, and we delivered. We moved away from the old approach of regulating through enforcement and opaque institutional operations, and the crypto space is the best example.”

Source: Michael Selig, Chairman of the CFTC

Democratic lawmakers focus on conflicts of interest

Most in the crypto industry welcomed Atkins’s approach, but criticism from Democratic members of Congress has escalated. The focus is on: some investigations and enforcement actions withdrawn by the SEC involved companies connected to Trump and his family, raising potential conflicts of interest.

Last week, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren accused Atkins of misleading Congress during a testimony. In her letter dated April 15, Warren pointed out that the SEC’s own data for fiscal year 2025 shows that the agency’s enforcement actions have fallen to the lowest levels in the past decade.

Despite the clear direction of withdrawal and regulatory easing, the SEC is still waiting for Congress to pass the Market Structure Act to formally clarify its regulatory authority over digital assets. Until the bill is enacted, the SEC’s crypto regulatory framework remains in a transitional state of “administrative guidance + case-by-case handling.”