The US government now has a law on the table that would do something remarkably simple yet unprecedented: force the Treasury to show its Bitcoin receipts. The American Reserve Modernization Act, or ARMA, was introduced on May 21, 2026, by Rep. Nick Begich of Alaska with 16 bipartisan co-sponsors backing the effort.
Ken Egan of the Bitcoin Policy Institute has endorsed the legislation as a strong governance measure, pointing to its clear custody standards and accountability mechanisms for taxpayer-owned digital assets.
What ARMA actually does
The federal government already holds Bitcoin. An executive order from March 2025 established a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and designated the Treasury as the primary custodian of Bitcoin gained through forfeitures and penalties. ARMA codifies what’s already happening and wraps it in a layer of structured oversight.
The bill mandates quarterly public “Proof of Reserve” reports for all federally held Bitcoin. Every three months, the Treasury has to publish verifiable evidence that the coins it claims to hold actually exist in wallets it controls.
