TL;DR
- CFTC Chair Michael Selig launched the Innovation Advisory Committee, replacing the Technology Advisory Committee, to guide AI and blockchain policy in derivatives markets.
- The panel draws from finance, regulators, tech, academia and public-interest groups, with nominations open through January 31, and focuses on AI, blockchain and cloud computing impacts.
- The move lands amid delayed Senate crypto legislation, stablecoin-reward lobbying and Coinbase warnings, as the CFTC builds a parallel rulemaking playbook.
Michael Selig, chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, has launched an Innovation Advisory Committee to guide how the agency approaches blockchain and artificial intelligence in commodity derivatives markets. The panel replaces the Technology Advisory Committee and is presented as Selig’s first major policy initiative since taking control of the regulator last month. The move elevates innovation governance to a board-level priority for the derivatives watchdog. Selig has framed the effort around building “clear rules of the road,” signaling a push for predictability as new tools modernize legacy systems. Markets ask what gets regulated first.
Innovation Advisory Committee scope and implications
Members will come from financial institutions, regulators, technology providers, public-interest groups, academia, and market-infrastructure firms, with charter members drawn from the CEO Innovation Council formed by former acting chair Caroline Pham. The agency is also seeking additional nominations through January 31. The committee is structured to widen the tent early, before policy hardens into compliance obligations. Its remit spans AI, blockchain, and cloud-computing applications, focusing on the commercial, economic, and practical implications that show up when models and networks meet real trading. Selig is seeking perspectives that can translate innovation hype into supervisory checklists quickly.
Selig is building on Pham’s modernization legacy, which included spot crypto trading on CFTC-registered exchanges, approval of a digital-asset markets pilot program accepting Bitcoin, Ether, and USDC as collateral, and no-action relief for four prediction-market operators. He also cited deployment of the agency’s first automated market surveillance system and regulatory relief that unlocked tens of billions in capital. The signal is that technology policy will be tethered to surveillance capability, not treated as theory. The charter directs members to recommend technology investment levels to support surveillance and enforcement. It covers financial services, derivatives, and commodities.
The advisory launch arrives as Senate digital-asset negotiations remain volatile after missed deadlines. Senate Agriculture Committee chair John Boozman postponed a planned markup of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act to late January amid talks. Banking groups intensified lobbying to restrict stablecoin rewards beyond the GENIUS Act framework, and Coinbase warned it could withdraw support if negotiators insert restrictions beyond enhanced disclosure requirements. Against that backdrop, the CFTC is building its playbook in parallel, using the committee as a pressure-tested sounding board. For firms, the work is engagement and mapping how controls may be tested.
