U.S. SEC Poised to Roll Out "Innovation Exemption" for Tokenized Stocks as Soon as This Week

May 19 (BlockBeats) — Bloomberg reported that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is expected as soon as this week to unveil an "innovation exemption" for tokenized equities, creating a new framework for trading onchain digital securities. According to the report, the SEC is leaning toward allowing third parties to issue tokens linked to stock prices without authorization or consent from the underlying public companies, enabling such instruments to trade on DeFi platforms. These third-party tokens would effectively function as synthetic assets that track equity prices, and some may not provide common-stock features such as voting rights or dividend entitlement. Under the SEC's proposal, platforms that cannot provide those rights would no longer be eligible to list the tokens. The initiative is seen as the first large-scale test of whether the U.S. regulatory system can support moving stock trading onto crypto-native infrastructure. Proponents say tokenized securities could enable near real-time settlement and 24/7 trading, improving market efficiency. Critics warn of market fragmentation, weaker price transparency, and diminished KYC and anti-money-laundering protections. Institutions including the New York Stock Exchange, Nasdaq, and Bullish have already moved into the tokenized stock space. Separately, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee previously advanced the Clarity Act, legislation focused on digital-asset market structure.