Crypto Country GuideCrypto rules and tax, country by country

United States: regulation

Last reviewed: October 2026

On this page
  1. Legal status and supervision
    1. SEC and CFTC
    2. The CLARITY Act
    3. Federal policy
  2. Exchanges and KYC
    1. State licenses and the New York BitLicense
  3. Stablecoins
  4. Crypto ATMs
  5. Scams and fraud
    1. How to recognize them
    2. Where to report
  6. Self-custody
    1. If you lose access or are scammed
  7. Sources
  • There is no single federal crypto law. The SEC, the CFTC, FinCEN and the IRS apply existing law, and the states license money transmitters. New York requires a BitLicense.
  • The CLARITY Act on crypto market structure passed the House in July 2025, but on 15 September 2026 the Senate failed to invoke cloture on taking it up (49 to 50). It is not law.
  • The GENIUS Act regulates payment stablecoins. Treasury expects it to take effect on 18 January 2027; the regulators are still writing the rules.
  • Crypto investment fraud cost Americans $7.2 billion in 2025, according to the FBI. Crypto ATMs are a common way scammers get paid.
  • No federal rule restricts self-custody wallets, and federal policy says it protects them.

This page covers who supervises crypto in the United States at the federal level, what that means when you use an exchange, and the rules for stablecoins, crypto ATMs and your own wallet. Which exchanges are registered and what they charge is on exchanges. It is general information, not legal advice.

Holding and trading crypto is legal. Several federal agencies apply existing law: the IRS for tax (it treats digital assets as property), the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) for anti-money-laundering rules, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for crypto that is a security, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) for commodities and derivatives. The states license and supervise money transmitters, and their rules differ.

SEC and CFTC

On 23 March 2026 an SEC interpretation on how the federal securities laws apply to crypto assets took effect, with guidance from the CFTC. It sets five categories: “digital commodities; digital collectibles; digital tools; stablecoins; and digital securities”, and names bitcoin, ether and fourteen other tokens as digital commodities. It is a Commission interpretation, not a statute. In August 2026 the SEC proposed “Regulation Crypto Assets”, with exemptions for raising money through crypto assets and a safe harbor from the term “investment contract”; comments are due by 20 October 2026. Since December 2025 spot crypto can trade on CFTC-registered exchanges. The SEC approved spot bitcoin exchange-traded products in January 2024, adding that it “did not approve or endorse bitcoin”.

The CLARITY Act

The Digital Asset Market Clarity Act (H.R. 3633) would set up a federal market structure for crypto. It passed the House on 17 July 2025 by 294 to 134. The Senate Banking Committee reported it with an amendment on 1 June 2026. On 15 September 2026 the Senate voted 49 to 50 on cloture on the motion to proceed, so it did not take the bill up; a motion to reconsider was entered the same day. At the time of writing (October 2026) it is not law.

Federal policy

Executive Order 14178 of 23 January 2025 states a policy of protecting the ability to maintain self-custody of digital assets, and prohibits federal agencies from working to establish, issue or promote a central bank digital currency, except as required by law. Executive Order 14233 of 6 March 2025 established a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve. Executive orders set policy; they do not change the law for individuals.

Exchanges and KYC

FinCEN’s regulation defines money transmission as accepting currency, funds or other value that substitutes for currency from one person and transmitting it to another location or person by any means. FinCEN’s 2013 guidance says that users of virtual currency are not money services businesses, while exchangers and administrators are money transmitters. A money transmitter must register with FinCEN within 180 days after it is established and renew every two calendar years. Its anti-money-laundering program must include verifying customer identification, filing reports and keeping records, so expect to show ID when you open an account. For transmittals of funds of $3,000 or more, the travel rule requires information about the sender and recipient to travel with the transfer.

State licenses and the New York BitLicense

FinCEN registration is not a license. Most states require their own money transmitter license, and the rules differ by state. The Conference of State Bank Supervisors says its Money Transmission Modernization Act gives “a single set of nationwide standards” for net worth, surety bonds and permissible investments, and that 31 states have enacted it in full or in part (September 2026). New York goes further: under 23 NYCRR Part 200, no one may engage in virtual currency business activity involving New York or a New York resident without a license from the Department of Financial Services (the BitLicense) or a New York limited purpose trust charter. How to check a provider is on exchanges.

Stablecoins

The GENIUS Act (Public Law 119-27, enacted on 18 July 2025) makes it unlawful for anyone other than a permitted payment stablecoin issuer to issue a payment stablecoin in the United States. It takes effect on the earlier of 18 months after enactment or 120 days after the regulators issue final rules; in an interim final rule of 30 September 2026, Treasury wrote that the effective date “is expected to be January 18, 2027”. The main rules of the act:

  • No interest. Issuers may not pay holders “any form of interest or yield” solely for holding, using or retaining the stablecoin.
  • Not insured, not a security. A payment stablecoin is not backed by the full faith and credit of the United States and not covered by FDIC deposit insurance. One issued by a permitted issuer is not a “security”.
  • Foreign stablecoins. From 18 July 2028, US platforms may not offer or sell a payment stablecoin to US persons unless a permitted issuer issued it. A foreign issuer qualifies only if Treasury finds its home regime comparable and it registers with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).
  • Your own wallet. The act’s prohibitions do not apply to transfers between individuals without an intermediary, or to transactions through a software or hardware wallet that facilitates “an individual’s own custody of digital assets”.

Treasury, the OCC, the FDIC, the Federal Reserve, the National Credit Union Administration and FinCEN published proposed rules between December 2025 and September 2026. At the time of writing (October 2026) the only final rule is Treasury’s interim final rule on procedures for reviewing state certifications. No list of permitted issuers, approved foreign issuers or comparable foreign regimes had been published, and we found no official finding on USDC or USDT. Until the act takes effect, state rules apply: New York’s Department of Financial Services issued guidance on 8 June 2022 for dollar-backed stablecoins issued by its licensees (full reserves, redemption at par, monthly attestations), and in 2026 it proposed a new 23 NYCRR Part 202 aligned with the act.

Crypto ATMs

Crypto ATMs (FinCEN calls them convertible virtual currency kiosks) are legal. In Notice FIN-2025-NTC1 of 4 August 2025, FinCEN said kiosk operators “are considered money services businesses (MSBs)” and must register, and warned that kiosks are used for scam payments. The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) received 13,460 complaints about crypto kiosks in 2025, with $389 million in losses, 58% more than in 2024. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) found in 2024 that people aged 60 and over accounted for about 71% of reported losses at bitcoin ATMs, with a median loss of $10,000.

Some states limit kiosks. California, for example, has limited kiosk transactions to $1,000 per customer per day since 1 January 2024, capped fees since 2025, and required kiosk operators to be licensed from 1 July 2026, according to its Department of Financial Protection and Innovation. Other states’ rules are not covered here.

Scams and fraud

The FBI’s IC3 2025 report counts 181,565 complaints with a crypto connection and $11.4 billion in losses. Crypto investment fraud was “the highest source of financial losses to Americans in 2025 with $7.2 billion”. Recovery scams, in which someone promises to get your lost money back for a fee, accounted for another $1.4 billion.

How to recognize them

  • Relationship investment scams. The SEC, the CFTC, FINRA and the state securities regulators (NASAA) warn jointly about “pig butchering”: someone you met online builds trust over weeks or months and then steers you to a fake trading platform. They warn that targets frequently “never recover their investment”, and paying more only adds to the loss.
  • Pressure to pay at a crypto ATM. Someone posing as the government, your bank or tech support tells you to withdraw cash and deposit it at a kiosk. FinCEN names this as a typical kiosk scam.
  • Recovery services. The IC3 says: “Be wary of cryptocurrency recovery services, especially those charging an up-front fee.” It does not work with law firms or crypto services to recover funds and “will never directly contact you for information or money”.

Where to report

WhereFor
FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (ic3.gov)Any online fraud involving crypto. Older victims can also call the National Elder Fraud Hotline, 833-372-8311
FTC (reportfraud.ftc.gov)Scams and fraud against consumers
SEC (sec.gov/tcr)Tips about securities fraud, including crypto offerings
CFTC (cftc.gov/complaint)Fraud involving commodities, including crypto trading
Your state regulator; in New York the Department of Financial ServicesProblems with a licensed provider

Know what reporting can and cannot do. The IC3 says it “does not conduct investigations” itself and cannot tell you the status of a complaint; it passes reports to law enforcement. Its Recovery Asset Team froze $679 million in 2025 across all the fraud cases it handled, but recovery is not guaranteed. Report quickly, and keep transaction IDs, wallet addresses and messages.

Self-custody

We found no federal rule that limits, registers or verifies private wallets, and Executive Order 14178 states a federal policy of protecting self-custody. The GENIUS Act also leaves transactions through your own software or hardware wallet outside its prohibitions. For tax, moving crypto between your own wallets is not a taxable event, and from 2025 basis is tracked wallet by wallet (see personal tax). The IRS broker regulations distinguish hosted wallets, custodial services that store private keys on behalf of others, from unhosted wallets, which store a user’s own private keys.

Holding your own keys means the keys are your responsibility. If you keep larger amounts of bitcoin yourself, this explanation of multisig versus single-sig sets out what each setup protects against.

If you lose access or are scammed

The IRS digital asset FAQs do not address lost keys. Two Chief Counsel Advice memos give the IRS’s view in specific cases; they cannot be cited as precedent:

  • A fall in value is not a loss. CCA 202302011 says there is no deductible loss for crypto that has dropped in value but still trades and has not been abandoned.
  • Scam losses. CCA 202511015 (March 2025) says victims of investment scams, including pig butchering, may deduct a theft loss if they entered the transaction for profit, it is a theft under state law, and there is no reasonable prospect of recovery. Losses from scams without a profit motive, such as romance scams, are not deductible, because the limit on personal casualty and theft losses applies. The 2025 tax law made that limit permanent.

Nobody can recover lost keys for your family either. How heirs and executors deal with crypto is covered in this guide to crypto inheritance in the United States, and the state law on executors’ access to online accounts (RUFADAA) in this guide to online accounts after death in the US.

Sources

This page is general information, not legal advice. Rules change, so check the official sources above before you act.