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A draft US Senate crypto market structure bill under consideration in the Senate Banking Committee includes language that could effectively treat several major altcoins, including XRP, Solana (SOL), Hedera (HBAR), Chainlink (LINK) and Dogecoin (DOGE), much like Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) under future US regulatory frameworks.
Market participants and analysts say this provision, if it survives revision, could have far-reaching implications for altcoin exchange-traded products (ETPs) and token classifications.
The draft bill, often discussed as part of a broader effort to overhaul US digital asset regulation and sometimes linked to the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act (the CLARITY Act), was released by Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott (R-SC) and key Republican and bipartisan co-sponsors including Senators Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), Bill Hagerty (R-TN), and Bernie Moreno (R-OH) in mid-2025.
At the heart of the Banking Committee’s draft is a new classification framework for digital assets that aims to clarify which tokens are treated as “ancillary assets” under securities laws and which are not.
A key provision in the draft states that tokens serving as the principal underlying asset of an exchange-traded product (ETP/ETF) listed on a national securities exchange, and registered under Section 6 of the Securities Exchange Act, as of January 1, 2026 would be deemed non-ancillary assets.
Being classified as non-ancillary matters because it means these tokens would be exempt from additional ancillary-asset disclosure obligations that apply to other digital assets still within regulatory ambiguity. Practically, this could align the regulatory treatment of XRP, SOL, HBAR, LINK and DOGE with that of Bitcoin and Ether, which are already widely recognized as commodities and form the basis of existing US spot and futures ETFs.
🚨NEW: Here’s an interesting section giving some tokens classification as non-ancillary assets based on their inclusion in exchange-traded products as of January 1, 2026.
It says that if a token is the main asset of an ETF listed on a national securities exchange and registered… https://t.co/zYJzn44P4k pic.twitter.com/3CiGMeEW9G
— Eleanor Terrett (@EleanorTerrett) January 13, 2026
Supporters argue this approach would provide regulatory clarity and certainty, especially for institutional investors eyeing altcoin ETF products.
💥 JUST IN: 🇺🇸 US Senate reveals crypto market structure draft bill
Bullish #XRP 🚀 pic.twitter.com/4wzaGGfIEF
— Amonyx (@amonyx) January 13, 2026
However, the draft remains subject to change during committee markup, and several provisions, including the ETF-based classification standard, could be revised.
The Senate Banking Committee has officially scheduled a markup session on January 15, 2026, where the draft text, including the ancillary-asset and token classification language, is set to be debated, amended, and possibly voted upon. This is a critical procedural step: a committee-approved version is necessary before the bill can advance to the Senate floor.
The markup comes after months of delay following a December 2025 decision to push market structure hearings into 2026, largely due to disagreements among members and broader legislative scheduling pressures.
In addition, the Senate Agriculture Committee, which has jurisdiction over the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), is also holding its own markup on January 15 for a competing or complementary digital asset bill, delaying a unified legislative proposal until both committees reconcile their versions.
The Agriculture Committee’s version emphasizes the CFTC’s role over spot markets and digital commodity trading, while the Banking Committee’s draft addresses securities laws and ancillary asset pathways.
Should the Banking Committee approve its draft, the next phases would include Senate floor consideration, negotiation with the Agriculture Committee’s text, and eventual reconciliation with the House, which passed its own version of the CLARITY Act in 2025. Only after those steps would the bill, if approved, go to the president for signature.
Until then, the draft’s provisions, especially those concerning how major altcoins may be classified based on ETF status, remain proposals under active debate.
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