The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission released a new staff accounting bulletin on Thursday that repeals the controversial SAB 121.
SAB 121 required banks and other government agencies to identify any customer’s crypto assets on their own balance sheets. Sub 122 “Rescues interpretive guidance” and instead directs entities to use Financial Accounting Standards Board regulations or International Accounting Standards provisions.
“Staff reminds entities that they should consider existing requirements for disclosures that allow investors to understand an entity’s obligation to safeguard crypto-assets held for others,” Thursday’s notice said.
The directive it rescues, SAB 121, was supported by former SEC Chair Gary Gensler, who said it would protect investors in the event of bankruptcy.
“What we’ve actually found in the bankruptcy court, time and time again, the bankruptcy court has said that crypto assets are not bankruptcy remote,” he said. Reuters In 2023.
However, SAB 121 drew from much of the crypto industry, and was the subject of a Congressional Review Act resolution passed by both the House and Senate, though that resolution There was a veto Former President Joe Biden wrote.
SEC Commissioner Hester Pierce, who was Recently named A new crypto task force, long opposed to the guidance, said after its adoption in 2022 that the guidance did not issue guidance on how the SEC applied securities laws to crypto and did not issue any guidance on what could be an accounting bulletin, and It may not be an accounting bulletin for the type of guidance contained in SAB 121.
Pierce announced the withdrawal Thursday.
Update (January 24, 2024, 00:00 UTC): Adds additional details.
