Congress proposes tax on Wall Street trading to fund public priorities
S. 2127 — Wall Street Tax Act of 2025 · Filed by Brian Schatz (D-HI) · 5 cosponsors · Introduced Jun 18, 2025 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill imposes a small tax on financial trading transactions—starting at 0.02% in 2026 and rising to 0.1% by 2030—on stocks, bonds, derivatives, and similar securities traded on U.S. exchanges or involving U.S. persons. The tax is collected by exchanges, brokers, or the parties to the transaction. Revenue from the tax would go to the federal government.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core mechanism is a progressive excise tax on securities and derivatives trading. It is straightforward in design and purpose: to tax financial transactions at rates that escalate over four years.
What the text implies
- The tax applies to derivatives and complex financial instruments, which may increase compliance costs for smaller brokers and financial advisors, potentially raising fees for retail investors.
- Controlled foreign corporations are treated as U.S. persons for tax purposes, extending the tax to some offshore trading activity and potentially affecting multinational firms' hedging strategies.
- The tax exempts initial securities issuances, meaning companies raising capital are not directly taxed, but secondary market trading is fully taxed—this may slightly reduce liquidity in secondary markets.
- The escalating rate structure (0.02% to 0.1% over four years) creates a cliff effect; traders may front-load transactions before rate increases, creating volatility spikes at year-end.
Who it affects
The tax is designed to reduce high-frequency speculative trading, which can destabilize markets and harm ordinary investors, while raising federal revenue without directly taxing wages, savings, or consumption. The burden falls primarily on financial traders and institutions, not households.
Who stands to gain
- U.S. federal government (revenue collection)
- Long-term investors and buy-and-hold retail investors (reduced high-frequency trading competition)
- Market stability advocates (reduced speculative volatility)
Named in the bill
Internal Revenue Service (IRS), Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), U.S. stock exchanges, Brokers, Controlled foreign corporations, U.S. persons
Where it stands
5 cosponsors: 5 Democrats.
- Jun 18, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Jun 18, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on Finance · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
3 lobbying clients named this bill on 3 disclosure filings across 1 quarter, Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $549,577 in lobbying spend. A filing names 48 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 61% of bills with at least one filing.
Brian Schatz, the sponsor, reported $431,697 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- American Federation of Teachers — $410,000 on 1 filing
- Public Citizen — $99,577 on 1 filing
- New Venture Fund — $40,000 on 1 filing
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the full bill text on Jul 6, 2026; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
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