This week, under Eastern Standard Time, it was reported that the cryptocurrency working group under the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is heading to Miami to engage in face-to-face discussions with a group of early cryptocurrency project builders, collecting frontline opinions on future policy reforms. This is not a simple roadshow or presentation, but rather resembles a "field sampling" by regulators before formally rewriting the rules, attempting to involve the industry in the gradual reshaping of the U.S. cryptocurrency regulatory framework. Against the backdrop of regulatory pressure and a desire for innovation, how strong regulatory demands can coexist with innovative vitality is beginning to shift from congressional hearing rooms to the developer hub in Miami, being re-discussed in spaces closer to real business scenarios.

Regulators Enter the Miami Developer Circle

The SEC's choice of Miami as the city for the cryptocurrency working group's research carries significant symbolic meaning. Over the past few years, Miami has attracted a large number of entrepreneurs focused on on-chain infrastructure, trading products, and asset applications through a combination of city branding, tax incentives, and a favorable business environment, forming a representative cluster in the U.S. cryptocurrency startup landscape. By leaving Washington and entering a city dominated by entrepreneurs and developers, regulators acknowledge that relying solely on policy documents and hearings in the capital is insufficient to comprehensively cover this rapidly evolving industry. The publicly available information about this research indicates that the working group plans to directly engage with early project teams to gather their opinions and case studies on issues such as token issuance models, protocol governance design, and liquidity organization methods, hoping to capture more actionable insights from frontline business practices to inform the drafting or adjustment of rules. Formally, this face-to-face communication is expected to help regulators establish a more realistic correspondence between technical details, business models, and compliance obstacles, rather than just understanding the industry through second-hand reports and enforcement cases. However, to date, the SEC has not disclosed key information such as the specific agenda for the Miami event, the selection criteria for participating projects, or whether a formal summary document will be produced, making it difficult for outsiders to assess its coverage, representativeness, and ultimate impact. The research's potential to truly translate into changes at the regulatory level remains in the realm of expectations.

Washington Stalls and Turns to Off-the-Record Listening

Before the SEC cryptocurrency working group headed south to Miami, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee had already faced multiple obstacles in the hearing process regarding the cryptocurrency market structure bill, with the related legislation stagnating amid procedural and political maneuvering. The signals emitted by this deadlock are very clear: relying on traditional congressional legislative paths to promote a complete new framework for the cryptocurrency market is unlikely to see breakthroughs in the short term. The stagnation at the congressional level stands in stark contrast to the SEC's proactive research efforts, where one side sees hearing schedules being postponed and disagreements among lawmakers remaining unresolved, while the other side sees the regulatory agency choosing to temporarily step away from the spotlight of the political stage to seek channels for communication with the industry. This shift in approach is not simply about "bypassing Congress," but rather resembles a transition from purely top-down design to a convergence of top-down and bottom-up information flow. By accumulating first-hand feedback from developers, project parties, and service providers through the working group, the SEC may be able to preemptively build a more detailed factual basis and potential consensus for future rule rewriting, reducing the pull caused by information asymmetry when formally entering the public rule-making process and political deliberation. Meanwhile, this approach also reflects a realistic stance from regulators on cryptocurrency market issues: under the constraints of legislative limitations, they are first trying to alleviate some of the uncertainties brought about by institutional gaps through research and rule interpretation.

From De-leveraging to a Mild New Cycle Dominated by Spot Trading

Insights from CryptoQuant analysts indicate that the cryptocurrency market has largely emerged from the previous round of severe de-leveraging, with the current rise being more clearly driven by spot buying rather than high-leverage derivatives. This means that after experiencing large-scale liquidations and on-chain clearings, the market structure is converging towards a state where leverage levels are relatively reduced, and price signals are more derived from genuine buying activity. In this cycle transition, regulators' perception of systemic risk is also undergoing slight adjustments: as large-scale leverage chains and complex derivative structures recede into the background, while price volatility remains intense, the probability of a single liquidation event or a chain reaction of cascading liquidations triggering further fallout decreases. The greater concern shifts towards market transparency, information disclosure, and trading behavior norms. From a regulatory perspective, a market with reduced leverage and increased spot weight is indeed more conducive to opening a window for dialogue based on rules, compared to a high-leverage cycle that could easily trigger chain liquidations. In the high-pressure context of "risk spiraling out of control," regulators are more inclined to first apply strict enforcement and restrictive measures to "hit the brakes"; whereas in a phase where the market structure appears "cleaner" and participant behavior is somewhat more restrained, discussing how to bring opaque gray areas into a predictable and enforceable regulatory framework is both more easily accepted by the public and less likely to be interpreted as undermining the market. The Miami research occurs against this backdrop, making it more targeted in terms of timing: not hastily intervening during the most chaotic moments, but attempting to engage in dialogue with a spot-dominated participant group in a mild new cycle following de-leveraging.

Global Polarization: Expansion of Use Under Regulatory Pressure

From a global perspective, the U.S. attempts to manage the cryptocurrency industry through market structure reforms and regulatory oversight stand in stark contrast to China's ongoing crackdown on illegal cryptocurrency trading activities. On one hand, China continuously reaffirms its zero-tolerance attitude towards related illegal activities through law enforcement and judicial documents, compressing the connectivity between the domestic financial system and cryptocurrency assets; on the other hand, U.S. regulators, while acknowledging the existence of risks, are more focused on discussing how to guide existing and new activities onto a track that is monitorable and intervenable by defining asset attributes, regulating trading platforms, and ensuring information disclosure. This polarized institutional environment creates a subtle tension with the real-world adoption of assets. Research briefs indicate that the usage rate of cryptocurrency payments in the high-end real estate sector is rising, and the demand for on-chain assets in certain cross-border asset allocation, wealth transfer, and new wealth management scenarios has not disappeared due to regulatory pressure; rather, it has become more active under the combination of price recovery and mature technological infrastructure. Thus, we observe a parallel contradictory state: while policy tightening continues, enforcement discourse emphasizes risk, prevention, and crackdown; actual trading and asset allocation scenarios, however, are tentatively expanding, embedding cryptocurrency assets into real estate, luxury goods, and even service industry payments through more complex pathways. This simultaneous tightening of policies and expansion of scenarios objectively accelerates the demand for more unified and transparent rules across jurisdictions—whether the starting point is to maintain financial stability or to reduce compliance costs for cross-border asset flows, fragmented regulation and gray areas will only raise risk premiums, ultimately increasing the barriers for compliant participants and traditional institutions to enter the market.

Is the Industry Invited to the Table or Passively Cooperating with Investigations?

In this global and market context, the SEC cryptocurrency working group's proactive approach to "consulting" early projects can be interpreted as a sincere attempt at co-creating rules, but it is also inevitably viewed by some industry insiders as part of a prelude to future enforcement actions. On one hand, from a procedural design and communication perspective, allowing builders to provide feedback before the rules are finalized theoretically helps improve the operability of regulatory provisions, avoiding the rigid application of traditional securities market templates to on-chain protocols and token economies. On the other hand, the industry is also aware that U.S. regulators have previously issued quite strong cases in areas such as token issuance and exchange compliance, forcing project parties and platforms to adjust their business structures through enforcement actions rather than new legislation; this memory naturally casts a shadow over current communication activities. Compared to past instances where factual standards were directly formed through enforcement, this Miami-style communication research may bring about a certain softening in tone and an upgrade of the regulatory toolbox: more use of pre-communication, guidance, and exemption pathways, rather than immediately opting for litigation and penalties as primary means. However, for early projects, participating in such policy discussions is itself a balancing act: on one hand, it is a rare opportunity to enter the regulatory spotlight and express the industry's genuine needs, potentially gaining some flexibility in token design, governance mechanisms, and compliance frameworks; on the other hand, limited channels for expression, uneven distribution of discourse power, and concerns about the boundaries of information disclosure will leave many teams hesitating between "openly sharing business models" and "avoiding becoming enforcement examples." Who qualifies to sit at the table, who merely observes from a distance, who can persuade regulators through technical details and data, and who is simply categorized as high-risk—these questions will be quietly answered in closed-door meetings and private exchanges.

The Journey of Rule Rewriting Has Just Begun

In summary, the SEC cryptocurrency working group's research trip to Miami is both symbolically significant and has clear practical boundaries. The symbolic significance lies in the regulators' willingness to listen to industry voices and leave space for participation in the rule rewriting process by stepping out of Washington and into the developer community; the practical boundaries, however, are that without legislative support and a higher-level policy consensus, even the most proactive research may be trapped at the level of guidance documents and case enforcement dialogues. Even so, if this round of research can ultimately crystallize into specific regulatory proposals, the key aspects it is most likely to influence are still worth the industry's continued attention: including whether token classification will see a more granular framework, how trading market structure will redraw lines between centralized platforms, on-chain protocols, and broker roles, and whether information disclosure requirements will provide more targeted standards for different types of token projects, rather than simply replicating traditional securities disclosure templates. It is important to note that there is currently a lack of authoritative public information supporting the background of the establishment of this cryptocurrency working group, its internal authorization scope, and whether there is a long-term plan for a "national roadshow" covering multiple locations across the U.S.; related claims remain in a stage awaiting verification. As the journey of rule rewriting has just begun, what is truly worth tracking may not be the heat of a single city event, but whether we can see the emergence of formal documents, regulatory proposals, and more site arrangements in succession—that will determine whether this dialogue in Miami is a footnote or a prologue.

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