WASHINGTON, D.C. — The crypto industry got a promise for action Tuesday from the Republican U.S. lawmakers who will have the authority to move digital assets legislation, with key members of the Senate and House of Representatives saying the sector will finally get what it's awaited for years.

The incoming Republican chair of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, Senator Tim Scott, and his counterpart on the House Financial Services Committee, Representative French Hill, were welcomed with enthusiasm by a Blockchain Association crowd in Washington, in sharp contrast to the uncertain tone of the same event last year. The two lawmakers said at the policy event that both chambers of Congress and the administration of President-elect Donald Trump will all be pulling in the same direction to make legislation happen.

The two starting points, they said, will be the Financial Innovation and Technology for the 21st Century Act (FIT21) — the bill to establish comprehensive crypto market guardrails that cleared the House this year by a wide bipartisan margin — and a stablecoin bill that was close to a bipartisan deal but ground to a halt over a few sticking points around the role of the federal and state governments.

"Congress needs to do its job, find a compromise and put things right," Hill said, suggesting his aim is to get passage of crypto market-structure legislation — something "like FIT21" — in the first few months of the session.

That's a familiar message from the House side of Congress, but it's the Senate that had long been the source of resistance. Senator Scott will soon arrive in his committee chairmanship with a stark reversal of Democrat predecessor Senator Sherrod Brown's crypto suspicion.

"In my opinion, it is the next wonder of the world," he said, also promising that his panel would have a crypto offshoot. "I'm going to be the chairman that creates a digital assets subcommittee for the first time."

Senator Brown, the current chairman, lost his Ohio Senate race in November, overcome by Republican Bernie Moreno, a blockchain businessman. Brown had been a key constraint to crypto progress in the Senate, though the new top Democrat of the committee will be Senator Elizabeth Warren, the progressive firebrand from Massachusetts, who is expected to loudly criticize crypto from the sidelines in the next couple of years.

Scott acknowledged, "She's very good at what she does."

But he said, "I think the future's incredibly bright," and he said he's already started conversations on crypto policy.