I 
117TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 5045 
To provide a safe harbor from licensing and registration for certain non- 
controlling blockchain developers and providers of blockchain services. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
AUGUST 17, 2021 
Mr. EMMER (for himself and Mr. SOTO) introduced the following bill; which 
was referred to the Committee on Financial Services 
A BILL 
To provide a safe harbor from licensing and registration 
for certain non-controlling blockchain developers and pro-
viders of blockchain services. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Blockchain Regulatory 
Certainty Act’’. 
SEC. 2. SAFE HARBOR FOR NON-CONTROLLING BLOCK-
CHAIN DEVELOPERS AND PROVIDERS OF 
BLOCKCHAIN SERVICES. 
(a) 
PROTECTION
FOR
NON-CONTROLLING 
BLOCKCHAIN SERVICES AND SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS.— 
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No blockchain developer or provider of a blockchain 
service shall be treated as a money transmitter (as defined 
under State licensing laws), a financial institution (as de-
fined under section 5312 of title 31, United States Code), 
or any other State or Federal legal designation requiring 
licensing or registration as a condition to acting as a 
blockchain developer or provider of a blockchain service, 
unless the developer or provider has, in the regular course 
of business, control over digital currency to which a user 
is entitled under the blockchain service or the software 
created, maintained, or disseminated by the blockchain de-
veloper. 
(b) EFFECT ON OTHER LAWS.— 
(1) INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAW.—Nothing 
in this section shall be construed to limit or expand 
any law pertaining to intellectual property. 
(2) STATE LAW.—Nothing in this section shall 
be construed to prevent any State from enforcing 
any State law that is consistent with this section. No 
cause of action may be brought and no liability may 
be imposed under any State or local law that is in-
consistent with this section. 
(c) DEFINITIONS.—As used in this section: 
(1) BLOCKCHAIN NETWORK.—The term ‘‘block-
chain network’’ means any system of networked 
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computers that cooperates to reach consensus over 
the state of a computer program and allows users to 
participate in the consensus-making process without 
the need to license proprietary software or obtain 
permission from any other user. The term includes, 
specifically, a public network of computers that co-
operates to reach consensus over the state of a dis-
tributed ledger describing transactions in a digital 
currency. 
(2) 
BLOCKCHAIN
DEVELOPER.—The 
term 
‘‘blockchain developer’’ means any person or busi-
ness that creates, maintains, or disseminates soft-
ware facilitating the creation or maintenance of a 
blockchain network or a blockchain service. 
(3) BLOCKCHAIN SERVICE.—The term ‘‘block-
chain service’’ means any information, transaction, 
or computing service or system that provides or en-
ables access to a blockchain network by multiple 
users, including specifically a service or system that 
enables users to send, receive, exchange, or store 
digital currencies described by blockchain networks. 
(4) CONTROL.—The term ‘‘control’’ means the 
legal right, authority, or ability to obtain upon de-
mand data sufficient to initiate transactions spend-
ing an amount of digital currency. 
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(5) DIGITAL
CURRENCY.—The term ‘‘digital 
currency’’ means a medium of exchange, a unit of 
account, or a store of value that is represented by 
entries in a distributed ledger generated by a 
blockchain network. 
Æ 
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