Hester Peirce, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) commissioner known as “Crypto Mom,” will leave the agency on October 2 after nearly nine years in the role.

Peirce announced her resignation in a letter posted on X. She thanked President Donald Trump for giving her the opportunity to serve and said her time at the SEC had been “the honor of my professional lifetime.”

She also expressed confidence in SEC Chairman Paul Atkins and Commissioner Mark Uyeda, who will remain at the agency after her departure.

“I leave this position confident that under the excellent leadership of Chairman Paul Atkins and Commissioner Mark Uyeda, the talented men and women of the Securities and Exchange Commission will continue to achieve that balance,” Peirce wrote.

Peirce's departure was expected. Her second five-year term ended in June 2025, but SEC rules allowed her to remain in office while waiting for a successor.

Peirce joined the SEC in January 2018. She became one of the agency's most vocal supporters of clearer rules for Bitcoin and digital assets. The nickname “Crypto Mom” came from her support for the industry and her repeated calls for regulators to provide clearer rules instead of relying mainly on enforcement actions.

She served under former SEC chairs Jay Clayton and Gary Gensler, both of whom oversaw periods of aggressive enforcement against digital asset companies. Peirce often disagreed with that approach.

In a 2019 speech, she said the SEC had “hindered innovation and growth” and criticized what she called a “parade of enforcement actions” rather than clear guidance.

Her influence grew after Donald Trump returned to the White House. In January 2025, Peirce was placed in charge of the SEC's Crypto Task Force, which was created to develop clearer policies for the digital asset market.

The task force worked on issues including Bitcoin and digital asset mining, staking, memecoins and how different types of digital assets should be classified. Under Peirce's leadership, the SEC moved beyond enforcement and toward developing formal rules for parts of the digital asset market.

One major initiative was the SEC's “innovation exemption.” The program created a five-year framework allowing certain tokenized securities to be issued and traded on blockchain-based platforms. The idea is to give the market room to develop while regulators study how the system works and consider permanent rules.

The SEC also recently issued new guidance covering several technical digital asset questions.

Among other things, it addressed issues such as token marketing, “essential managerial efforts,” staking receipt tokens and when activity in a secondary market could make a participant a promoter of an investment contract.

Peirce's departure will leave the SEC with just two commissioners: Chairman Paul Atkins and Mark Uyeda.

The SEC's rules allow two commissioners to continue conducting business when the agency is temporarily short-staffed. However, having only two members could make some decisions more difficult or slow the pace of new policy.

The White House has not announced replacements for Peirce or other vacant seats at the SEC. It has also not named Democratic nominees to the SEC or the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

The situation comes at an important time for digital assets regulation in the United States.

The CLARITY Act, which aimed to create a broader legal framework for digital assets and clarify the roles of the SEC and CFTC, recently failed to advance in the Senate. That leaves regulators with a larger role in determining how the digital asset market will operate while Congress considers future legislation.

Peirce's next job is already known. Regent University announced in May that she will join its School of Law as an associate professor in November.

Her October 2 departure will close a nearly nine-year chapter at the SEC. For the Bitcoin industry, her exit comes as the agency continues working on rules covering digital assets, tokenized securities and Bitcoin and digital asset market structure.