119-hr3533

[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3533 Introduced in House

    (IH) ]

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119th CONGRESS
 1st Session
 H. R. 3533

 To provide a safe harbor from licensing and registration for certain 
 non-controlling blockchain developers and providers of blockchain 
 services.

_______________________________________________________________________

 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

 May 21, 2025

 Mr. Emmer (for himself and Mr. Torres of New York) introduced the 
 following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Financial 
 Services

_______________________________________________________________________

 A BILL

 To provide a safe harbor from licensing and registration for certain 
 non-controlling blockchain developers and providers of blockchain 
 services.

 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

 This Act may be cited as the ``Blockchain Regulatory Certainty 
Act''.

SEC. 2. SAFE HARBOR FOR NON-CONTROLLING BLOCKCHAIN DEVELOPERS AND 
 PROVIDERS OF BLOCKCHAIN SERVICES.

    (a) Protection for Non-Controlling Blockchain Services and Software 
Developers.--No blockchain developer or provider of a blockchain 
service shall be treated as a money transmitter or as engaging in 
``money transmitting'' (as defined under any State or Federal law), a 
financial institution (as defined under 

section 5312 of title 31, 
United States Code), any other State or Federal legal designation 
requiring licensing or registration, or triggering liability for 
unlicensed or unregistered conduct, unless the developer or provider 
has, in the regular course of business, control over digital assets to 
which a user is entitled under the blockchain service or the software 
created, maintained, or disseminated by the blockchain developer or 
provider.

    (b) Effect on Other Laws.--

    (1) Intellectual property law.--Nothing in this section 
 shall be construed to limit or expand any law pertaining to 
 intellectual property.

    (2) State law.--Nothing in this section shall be construed 
 to prevent any State from enforcing any State law that is 
 consistent with this section. No cause of action may be brought 
 and no liability may be imposed under any State or local law 
 that is inconsistent with this section.
            (c) === Definitions. ===
-As used in this section:

    (1) Blockchain developer.--The term ``blockchain 
 developer'' means any person or business that creates, 
 maintains, or disseminates software facilitating the creation 
 or maintenance of a blockchain network or a blockchain service.

    (2) Blockchain network.--The term ``blockchain network'' 
 means any system of networked computers that cooperates to 
 reach consensus over the state of a computer program and allows 
 users to participate in the consensus-making process without 
 the need to license proprietary software or obtain permission 
 from any other user. The term ``blockchain network'' includes, 
 specifically, a public network of computers that cooperates to 
 reach consensus over the state of a distributed ledger 
 describing transactions in a digital asset.

    (3) Blockchain service.--The term ``blockchain service'' 
 means any information, transaction, or computing service or 
 system that provides or enables access to a blockchain network 
 by multiple users, including specifically a service or system 
 that enables users to send, receive, exchange, or store digital 
 assets described by blockchain networks.

    (4) Control.--The term ``control'' means the unilateral and 
 independent legal right, authority, or ability to obtain upon 
 demand data sufficient to initiate transactions spending an 
 amount of digital assets, without requiring the approval, 
 consent, or direction of any other third party.

    (5) Digital asset.--The term ``digital asset'' means any 
 form of intangible personal property that can be exclusively 
 possessed and transferred person to person without necessary 
 reliance on an intermediary.
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