SEC Commissioner Peirce counters views that crypto rule will foster synthetic tokens

The long-awaited U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rule to begin allowing tokenization of securities — a change that could have profound effects on the financial markets — has been facing the contentious perception it'll allow synthetic tokens, but a commissioner has taken the unusual step to post statements about the unpublished rule to potentially counter those views.

SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce, who had pushed for safe harbors for tokenization well before the arrival of the new chairman under President Donald Trump, issued a pair of statements on social media site X on Thursday and Friday to clarify what she expects from the rule that's set to emerge soon. Her posts suggested that the proposed rule won't pave the way for synthetic tokenized securities — third-party tokenization that references a security but doesn't carry the equity, voting and other rights associated with the security.

Peirce, the commissioner behind the SEC's Crypto Task Force, wrote that she expects the coming rule would be "limited in scope & would facilitate trading only of digital representations of the same underlying equity security that an investor could purchase in the secondary market today, not synthetics."

Peirce posted again to explain what she meant by synthetics, directing people to read the SEC's January statement on tokenized securities, "which distinguishes tokenized versions of issuer-sponsored stocks and of stocks that SEC-registered firms hold for their customers from synthetic instruments that provide exposure to stocks."

The flames had been fanned by Bloomberg News reporting this week that predicted the agency was leaning toward including a path for synthetic tokens tradeable on decentralized crypto platforms. Peirce said she appreciates the public's keen interest in the rule "but not the hyperbole" about it.

Peirce did not return a request for comment about her posts.

The consequential rule will represent the most meaningful step the SEC has taken to-date to forge a new regulatory approach to crypto trading in the U.S. Chairman Paul Atkins has been saying for months that his agency is poised to release the wide-ranging proposals to provide regulatory exemption in the crypto space.