Gary Gensler is absent from the SEC and crypto-friendly Mark Uyeda is present

Commissioner Mark Uyeda will take the helm of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as the agency awaits Senate confirmation of President Donald Trump’s pick for the permanent position, Paul Atkins.

Acting Chairman Uyeda, who has been a strong supporter of the regulator’s easing of prosecutions in the crypto sector alongside fellow Republican Commissioner Hester Peirce, previously served Atkins as legal counsel within the ‘agency. Atkins, who was officially appointed hours after Trump was sworn in on Monday, is a former commissioner who developed ties to crypto at his Washington consulting business.

Uyeda expressed his own opinions on the role of the SEC regarding digital assets. He regularly criticized the commission’s majority on measures to control crypto, such as the so-called Staff Accounting Bulletin 121 (SAB 121), which made it difficult for banks to retain their digital asset customers. He said he favored its elimination – a decision that now falls within his authority.

The change in chair has not yet been officially announced to the agency, although the remaining commissioners – including Hester Peirce and Caroline Crenshaw – have issued a joint statement on the departure of former chair Gary Gensler.

“Even though we as commissioners have approached policy issues from different angles, there has always been dignity in our differences,” the commissioners said. “Chairman Gensler is committed to bipartisan engagement and a respectful exchange of ideas, which has helped facilitate our service to the American public.”

Gensler previously announced he would resign at noon on January 20 – the same time Trump was sworn in.

Gensler has become the crypto industry’s primary government antagonist in recent years. He pursued lawsuits, pushed a controversial crypto accounting policy, favored proposals for strict rules that threatened the industry’s business model, and blocked – for a time – the creation of exchange-traded funds Spot Cryptocurrency ETFs. On the latter point, a court ruling against the agency forced Gensler’s hand, and he ultimately voted with committee Republicans to clear the way for ETFs.

His agency argued in court that existing law was sufficient to categorize and regulate crypto assets. This position has been favored by some federal judges and opposed by others, and the central issues are still under discussion in the courts.

Uyeda’s SEC, regardless of his tenure, is absent from virtually every top legal official who worked under Gensler, including in the Enforcement Division and the General Counsel’s Office .

The acting president has all the authority of the office, but people in this position sometimes choose to defer to the new president and wait for major decisions.

At the SEC’s sister agency, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Republican Commissioner Caroline Pham was named acting chair, although Trump has not yet named a permanent successor to outgoing Democratic Chairman Rostin Behnam.

Unlike the CFTC, which currently has a 2-to-2 party split, SEC Republicans are 2-to-1 outnumbered by just the Democrat.