ContextRemarks to the Economic Club of Dallas in Texas; the SEC protects investors and keeps markets fair and efficient, and its main challenge is fewer companies choosing to list.
Why it mattersIt outlines the SEC chairman's agenda on public listings, crypto asset rules and rulemaking, and signals a shift in how the regulator approaches corporate disclosure.
- The number of public companies has fallen steeply for decades, shrinking access to public markets.
- Heavy rules have pushed companies away from listing instead of inviting them in.
- Digital asset innovators lacked a clear, tailored path to raise capital in the United States.
- Reform registered offerings and filer status to make going public cheaper and easier.
- Propose a dedicated framework for crypto assets with its own capital-raising routes.
- Roll back the climate disclosure rule and let states like Texas design their own shareholder proposal systems.
Read the speech summary
1. The philosophy behind the agenda
Addressing a business club in Texas, SEC Chairman Paul Atkins says the agency is going back to founding ideas of individual freedom, competition and limited central control. He argues the regulator drifted: rules served political and social goals, enforcement hurt innovators more than wrongdoers, disclosure was bent toward what officials found interesting, and uncertainty over digital assets pushed founders and investors offshore, into markets with weaker safeguards. His aim is American markets that stay deep, competitive and innovative, with strong investor protection and disclosure tied to materiality.
2. Reviving public markets
The centrepiece is a plan to bring back initial public offerings, since the number of listed firms has fallen for decades and the burden of being public has become heavy. Proposals let companies report twice a year instead of four times, overhaul registered offerings and filer categories so obligations match size and maturity, and withdraw the earlier climate disclosure rule. He reports that more than 580 firms listed from early 2025 to mid-2026, up 75% on the previous period, raising $208 billion, with 47 listings in Texas, over a tenth of the national total.
3. Digital assets
Under Project Crypto the agency now says most crypto assets are not securities in themselves, so issuers and buyers can know the status before acting rather than learning it from enforcement cases. An August proposal, Regulation Crypto Assets, would create tailored routes to raise capital, and an innovation exemption would allow on-chain trading of tokenised securities within a supervised framework, with more to come.
4. Governance and Texas
He wants to repeal Rule 14a-8 so states, not the SEC, decide what shareholders may vote on, arguing the federal role since 1942 lacked authority and that competition among states will improve outcomes. Texas, with lower public-company costs, a new business court, headquarters moves, reincorporations by well-known firms and its own stock exchange, is held up as the model, and he closes by calling the reforms a homecoming to first principles.