California: Crypto Task Force and Legislation

Task force: ConcludedReserve: FailedKiosks: Law

Task force or study body Confirmed

Blockchain Working Group (AB 2658, 2018) · Concluded

• Created by: AB 2658 (Calderon), Chapter 875, Statutes of 2018, approved September 28, 2018 (LegiScan). It added and repealed Government Code Sections 11546.8 and 11546.9 and is titled 'Secretary of the Government Operations Agency: working group: blockchain technology.' We could not open the chaptered text, so the statutory wording is not confirmed first-hand.
• Organized by: California Government Operations Agency (GovOps). Per the working group's final report, GovOps set up an internal advisory group for the nomination and selection process, provided logistical support, and contracted the California State University, Sacramento Consensus and Collaboration Program to facilitate. GovOps' blockchain page says the Agency Secretary appoints the group and its chair. The report's chair letter describes the group as an independent body whose ideas do not necessarily reflect administration policy. The Department of Technology helped distribute a January 2020 survey of state IT employees. We found no mention of the Office of Digital Innovation in the report.
• Led by: Camille Crittenden, PhD, chair; executive director of CITRIS and the Banatao Institute, University of California (named in the July 2020 report and on the GovOps page; both undated or 2020, so current leadership is not applicable now that the group has ended).
• Members: The final report lists 21 people (the GovOps page lists 20; one consumer-organization member, Kai Stinchcombe, withdrew before the report was finished). Technology industry: Brian Behlendorf (Linux Foundation), Audrey Chaing (Blockchaing), David Tennenhouse (VMware). Non-technology: Ben Bartlett (Berkeley City Council), Meredith Lee (West Big Data Innovation Hub), Anne Neville-Bonilla (California State Library). Law: Jason Albert (Workday), Liz Chien (Ripple Labs), Michele Neitz (Golden Gate University School of Law). Privacy: Arshad Noor (StrongKey), Sheila Warren (World Economic Forum). Consumer: Radhika Iyengar-Emens (DoubleNova Group). State officials: Amy Tong (State CIO, Department of Technology), Keely Bosler (Director of Finance; Ted Ryan as designee), Benjamin Bonte (Industrial Relations CIO), Sergio Gutierrez (CalEPA CIO), Kem Musgrove (Franchise Tax Board CIO). Legislature: Sen. Robert Hertzberg and Assemblymember Ian Calderon.
• Outputs and timeline: Seven full-group meetings between September 2019 and June 2020, a finance subcommittee (two meetings) and a regulatory subcommittee (one meeting), more than 150 public comments, and a final report to the Legislature dated July 2020 (the statute required it by July 1, 2020). The report recommended, among other things, considering removal of barriers to counties using blockchain in vital records. GovOps' page says the authorizing law sunsets January 1, 2022; we found no activity after the 2020 report.

Sources: Blockchain Working Group Final Report (July 2020), GovOps, GovOps: Blockchain Working Group page, LegiScan: AB 2658 (2018), Chapter 875

The Blockchain Working Group has concluded; we found no active California crypto or blockchain task force. A secondary law-firm summary reports that DFPI co-leads a Tech Fraud Task Force that first met on June 22, 2026; we have not confirmed its scope or whether it covers digital assets. We did not find any source saying the Working Group followed The Digital Chamber's model bill.

Bitcoin or digital asset reserve law Reported

California has no state bitcoin reserve law. AB 2335 (Valencia, Unclaimed property: digital financial assets), which would have created a Digital Asset Reserve Fund by converting escheated digital assets, passed the Assembly 78-0 on May 27, 2026, cleared Senate Judiciary 12-0 on June 30, was placed on the Senate Appropriations suspense file on August 3 and was held under submission on August 13, 2026, per CalMatters Digital Democracy. It was not enacted. The site does not formally label it dead, and we have not seen the amended text, so details of the Senate version are unconfirmed. Separately, the earlier AB 1052 was reported as signed in October 2025 and preserves unclaimed digital assets in their original form rather than selling them; that is an unclaimed-property rule, not a reserve.

Sources: CalMatters Digital Democracy: AB 2335 history, NCSL 2026 crypto legislation tracker (A 2335), The Block: California approves law to preserve unclaimed crypto (Oct 14, 2025)

Licensing Confirmed

The Digital Financial Assets Law (AB 39 and SB 401, signed Oct. 13, 2023; Fin. Code Div. 1.25) requires a Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI) license to conduct digital financial asset business activity with California residents. AB 1934 (signed Sept. 29, 2024) moved the licensing date to July 1, 2026; DFPI's page says that from July 1, 2026 covered firms must hold a license or have submitted a completed application, and applications go through NMLS (opened March 9, 2026, per Decrypt). A law-firm update (Morrison Foerster, July 2026) reports that the Office of Administrative Law disapproved DFPI's rules in May 2026 for technical reasons and approved the revised rules on June 29, 2026, and that SB 97, signed June 30, 2026 as an urgency measure, repealed DFAL's stablecoin chapter (Chapter 6), widened the conditional-license pathway (New York cutoff moved to Jan. 1, 2025) and excluded certain in-game, loyalty and ownership-record assets. We have not confirmed those June 2026 items on a government page, and we found no counts of licenses issued. This corrects the earlier note that stablecoin approval provisions began July 1, 2026. California has not been reported as adopting the ULC UVCBA.

Sources: DFPI: Digital Financial Assets Law, Morrison Foerster: California digital assets and fintech update (Jul 2026), Decrypt: DFAL enforcement and application window (Feb 18, 2026), Goodwin: DFAL application open (Apr 2026), Greenberg Traurig: California DFAL is now operative (Jul 2026; seen in search results, not opened)

Crypto kiosks (ATMs) Confirmed

DFAL Chapter 9 (SB 401) sets kiosk rules, per DFPI's kiosk-operator page (last updated Oct. 20, 2026): since Jan. 1, 2024, location reporting, a $1,000 per customer per day limit and receipts; since Jan. 1, 2025, a separate pre-transaction disclosure (amount, fees, price versus a licensed exchange, and a warning that transactions are final if no refund method exists) and a fee cap of the greater of $5 or 15%; and kiosk operator licensing from July 1, 2026, with operators responsible for ensuring third parties using their kiosks are licensed. A Los Angeles Superior Court ruling of Aug. 30, 2024 dismissed a challenge to the daily limit. DFPI's page sets no general refund requirement.

Sources: DFPI: information for kiosk operators (updated Oct 20, 2026), DFPI: Digital Financial Assets Law

Industry groups (non-governmental)

• California Blockchain Advocacy Coalition (CBAC) (NABA member): State blockchain advocacy group, listed as one of the eight founding members of the North American Blockchain Association (NABA), formed in January 2025 to give federal policymakers joint crypto policy recommendations. It has engaged DFPI's DFAL rulemaking: DFPI posted a document titled as a notice of modification to proposed regulation PRO 02-23 with the coalition's name (December 2025; we saw it in search results but did not open it). We did not find leadership details.

Sources: NABA founding members (relayed report of Jan 2025 launch), DFPI posting naming the coalition, PRO 02-23 (Dec 2025; not opened), Coalition's Medium page (seen in search results)

Other 2025 to 2026 actions

• 2026-08-13: AB 2335, the Digital Asset Reserve Fund bill, was held under submission in Senate Appropriations and was not enacted (CalMatters Digital Democracy). NCSL's 2026 tracker still lists AB 1180 (stablecoin payments under DFAL), AB 2285 (bank digital asset custody), AB 2409 (meme coin ban for public officers) and SB 1208 (money laundering and digital assets) as pending; we did not verify their final outcomes.
• 2026-07-01: DFAL licensing became operative. DFPI's rules were reportedly approved by the Office of Administrative Law on June 29, 2026 after an earlier May disapproval, and SB 97 (signed June 30, 2026) repealed the stablecoin chapter, per a law-firm update. No license approval or enforcement outcomes were found.
• 2025-10: AB 1052 (Valencia, digital financial assets and unclaimed property) was reported as signed in October 2025, preserving unclaimed digital assets in original form instead of forced liquidation. This corrects the earlier record, which relied on a LegiScan entry showing it held in Senate committee on Aug. 29, 2025; the chaptered number and signing date were not confirmed from the legislature.

Sources: CalMatters Digital Democracy: AB 2335, NCSL 2026 tracker, Morrison Foerster update (Jul 2026), DFPI DFAL page, The Block (Oct 14, 2025), Decrypt: governor signs law on unclaimed crypto, CalMatters Digital Democracy: AB 1052 (seen in search results)

Source notes: Blockchain Working Group information dates from 2020 (report) and an undated GovOps page; the group has concluded. AB 2335 status reflects CalMatters data through Aug. 13, 2026 and no later session information was checked. June-July 2026 DFAL rulemaking and SB 97 facts rest on one law-firm update. AB 1052's enactment rests on secondary press and conflicts with an earlier LegiScan entry; the legislature's own pages could not be accessed.