The House Financial Services Committee is scheduled to open a markup and committee vote on H.R. 8957, the American Reserve Modernization Act of 2026, on Wednesday, September 16, 2026, at 10:00 a.m. Eastern time. This marks the first time a US Strategic Bitcoin Reserve proposal has moved from executive action into a binding legislative process, and the outcome will determine whether the bill reaches the full House floor.
Introduced on May 21, 2026, by Alaska Representative Nick Begich with Maine Democrat Jared Golden as co-lead, ARMA would codify a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve inside the U.S. Treasury Department. The Treasury Secretary would have 180 days to establish secure Bitcoin storage infrastructure after enactment. A separate Digital Asset Stockpile would hold seized non-Bitcoin digital assets, and proceeds from selling or converting those assets could only be used to buy more Bitcoin or reduce the national debt.
One of the bill's defining provisions is a 20-year minimum lockup for any Bitcoin placed in the reserve. No sales, swaps, auctions, or collateral use would be permitted, with a single exception: the Treasury could sell reserve Bitcoin only to reduce the national debt, which exceeded $39 trillion when the legislation was introduced. Supporters argue that removing hundreds of thousands of coins from circulation for two decades tightens the effective supply of an asset capped at 21 million units.
The federal government already controls roughly 328,372 BTC, almost all from law-enforcement seizures. Estimated holdings include about 127,271 BTC from the Prince Group seizure, around 94,600 BTC tied to the Bitfinex hack recovery, approximately 94,000 BTC from Silk Road recoveries, and about 11,800 BTC from miscellaneous DOJ and IRS cases. ARMA would require every federal agency to transfer its Bitcoin and other digital assets to centralized Treasury custody.
The bill sets a target of acquiring up to 1 million BTC, at up to 200,000 coins per year over five years, but this goal depends on a Treasury study into budget-neutral acquisition strategies rather than a guaranteed purchase mechanism. One proposal under discussion would revalue Treasury gold certificates, still carried at a statutory price of $42.22 per ounce since 1973, to market price. However, ARMA does not enact that revaluation directly; it directs a study, and separate legislation would be required.
Custody language in ARMA is extensive. It would require geographically distributed private keys in air-gapped facilities, multi-signature governance involving the Treasury, the Federal Reserve, and an independent third agency, plus investment in quantum-resistant cryptography. The Treasury would publish quarterly proof-of-reserve reports backed by independent third-party audits, a transparency standard not present in the current executive-order reserve. The bill also protects citizens' right to self-custody their own keys and allows individual states to store their own Bitcoin in Treasury custody while keeping holdings segregated.
The current federal Bitcoin reserve rests on Executive Order 14233, signed in March 2025. A future president could reverse that order with a signature. ARMA aims to make the reserve durable by statute, meaning new legislation would be needed to undo it. Even with a favorable committee vote, the bill must still pass the full House, the Senate with its 60-vote filibuster threshold, and receive the President's signature. The markup is being moved alongside the CLARITY Act, a broader digital-asset market-structure bill, in a coordinated legislative push ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
