The US Securities and Exchange Commission has proposed to limit Exchange Rule 15c2-11 to apply only to equity securities, a technical change that could have a significant impact on the structure of the crypto market. For digital assets, this proposal represents a more coherent regulatory approach after years of trying to force crypto into the frameworks built for traditional securities.
In a press release issued on March 16, the SEC stated that Rule 15c2-11 has historically focused on preventing deceptive and fraudulent schemes in the stock market. This proposed amendment would revise the law to refer only to equity securities, leaving room for broader application to other asset classes.
A Quiet But Meaningful Crypto Win
That is important because Rule 15c2-11 governs certain information collection and review requirements for dealers who publish quotations, or maintain a continuous quoted market, for shares in the OTC market. By clearly attaching the rule to stocks, the SEC appears to be drawing a clean line where those obligations begin and end.
SEC Chairman Paul S. Atkins framed the move as a regulatory issue rather than an ideological one. “Regulations should be tailored to suit the asset class in which they operate,” Atkins said. “This proposal would clarify regulatory obligations when publishing quotations and confirm what has always been understood: Rule 15c2-11 applies to equity securities.”
For crypto market participants, the proposal reads like more than a cleanup of the draft. Marty Bent, writing at X (@TFTC), argued that the change quietly reverses the stance that defined much of the SEC’s previous era. “The SEC recently proposed to exclude crypto assets from the OTC market rules governing broker-dealer quotes. These are rules originally designed for penny stocks and thinly traded stocks.”
He went ahead, making the amendment a subtle but palpable break from the playbook of the previous organization. “This is a quiet but logical change. Instead of forcing Bitcoin and crypto into the existing securities framework, the SEC is making it clear. The amended rules (Rule 15c2-11) set out how broker-dealers can publish securities quotes. By clarifying that crypto does not fall under these requirements, the SEC is set up as a traditional SEC like the SEC shares.”
That interpretation may be sound because Rule 15c2-11 was not drafted with digital assets in mind. Its early work was tied to OTC stocks, especially the kind of low-traded names that were vulnerable to quote manipulation and fraud. In that context, the SEC’s proposal doesn’t create a bespoke crypto regime, but it does something almost as important: it narrows the set of legacy securities rules that might be extended to cover crypto automatically.
Bent also compared the proposal to the heavy-handed enforcement approach associated with former Chairman Gary Gensler. “Under Gensler, the approach was the opposite, enforce everything in the existing rules, and then sue when companies can’t comply. This is a regulatory situation that goes from ‘prove you’re not a mortgage’ to ‘these rules weren’t made for you.’
This proposal is now directed to the general public agenda. The SEC said the release will be published on SEC.gov and later in the Federal Register, with a 60-day comment period beginning after publication in the Federal Register. That leaves room for revision, but the message is already clear enough: the agency is increasingly willing to separate crypto from the infrastructure and speculation of legacy equity markets.
At the time of publication, the total crypto market stood at $2.51 trillion.
The featured image was created with DALL.E, a chart from TradingView.com
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