The CLARITY Act vote was 15 to 9. After nearly a year of negotiations, closed-door talks, and a parade of failed amendments, the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act cleared the U.S. Senate Banking Committee on May 14.
It now moves to the Senate floor.
Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott, a Republican from South Carolina, led the charge. Scott said the bill was the product of months of good-faith negotiations between Republicans, Democrats, and a wide range of stakeholders. “This legislation does not take sides between traditional finance and new technology, or Republicans and Democrats,” Scott said in his opening remarks. “It takes the side of everyday Americans.”
What Actually Cleared the Room
Two Democrats broke from their party to vote in favour. Senator Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland and Senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona both sided with the Republican majority, giving the CLARITY Act its bipartisan stamp. Alsobrooks had also been at the centre of compromise language negotiations in the weeks before the markup.
The bill now carries a formal name: H.R. 3633, the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act of 2025. It draws a line, long demanded by the industry, between SEC and CFTC jurisdiction over digital assets. Securities on one side. Commodities on the other. The bill also carves out a specific path for decentralised finance, shielding software developers who do not control user funds from being regulated as money transmitters.
That DeFi protection has been a quiet but significant victory for builders who have operated in legal grey for years.
The Part Nobody Has Fully Settled
The ethics provision is still unresolved. Democrats, including Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, have been clear that the bill will not reach 60 votes on the Senate floor without language addressing conflicts of interest between government officials and the crypto sector. President Trump’s family crypto dealings are the elephant in the room no one in the official statements names directly.
White House crypto adviser Patrick Witt signalled earlier this month that the administration’s position is rules that apply uniformly, from the president to the newest Capitol Hill intern. Democrats want something more specific. That gap has not closed.
Senator Alsobrooks acknowledged the outstanding work in her vote statement. “My vote today is a vote to keep working in good faith,” she said. “We still have so much work to do.”
The 60-vote threshold in the Senate is not ceremonial. It is the actual barrier. Getting there requires pulling more Democrats across, and the ethics fight is the main obstacle standing in the way.
Lummis Has Been Building This for Four Years
Senator Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, who chairs the Senate Banking Subcommittee on Digital Assets, has been the legislative engine behind this bill. She first co-introduced digital asset framework legislation with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand in 2022, reintroduced it in 2023, and has pushed successive drafts through the Senate Banking Committee since July 2025.
Her statement after the vote carried a warning worth reading carefully.
“Without the Clarity Act, the digital asset industry will move offshore to any nation that has regulators willing to engage. Every day that we stall is a day we hand our competitors an advantage we won’t get back. The Clarity Act is critical to securing our financial future.” — Senator Cynthia Lummis on X
That warning is not abstract. Markets in East Africa, Southeast Asia, and parts of Latin America have already absorbed significant crypto builder and user activity that originated in the United States. Kenyan retail crypto holders who use U.S.-built platforms regularly bear the downstream consequences of American regulatory uncertainty — from delistings to restricted product access. Clarity, or the continued absence of it, will shape what tools are available to users far outside Washington.
Polymarket currently puts the probability of the CLARITY Act passing in 2026 at 67%, according to Grayscale’s analysis of the bill published the same week.
Coinbase’s CEO Had Been Watching Closely
Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase, responded immediately after the committee vote.
“The crypto market structure bill has PASSED the Senate Banking Committee with a bi-partisan vote! Historic day for crypto and for the future of digital assets in America. Grateful for the countless hours from lawmakers and staff to strengthen this legislation. Big improvement from where we were in January on rewards, tokenization, DeFi, and CFTC authority. I’m proud we stood up for our customers in that moment, and the bill is better because of it. Looking forward to a bipartisan law that cements the US as the world’s crypto capital. Let’s get CLARITY done.” — Brian Armstrong on X
Armstrong’s reference to rewards, tokenisation, and CFTC authority points to specific battles inside the bill that Coinbase had lobbied on. The stablecoin yield provision was among the most contested. The final language in the 309-page bill text restricts rewards that are economically or functionally equivalent to interest on passive stablecoin holdings, a compromise between banking groups who wanted stricter limits and crypto platforms that wanted broader yield access.
The section-by-section breakdown also establishes Regulation Crypto, an exemption from SEC registration for certain digital asset offerings. Companies can raise up to $50 million per calendar year under the exemption, or up to 10% of the total value of outstanding ancillary assets, capped at $200 million in gross proceeds total.
That capital formation path is what smaller token projects have been waiting on. It is also what critics, including Scott Greytak, deputy executive director of Transparency International U.S., say creates illicit finance risk. Greytak said in a statement that the bill “leaves serious illicit finance gaps” and warned against building a new financial architecture that bad actors can exploit outside standard anti-money laundering safeguards.
The bill now merges with a parallel track that already cleared the Senate Agriculture Committee. Both chambers of Congress still need to align. Final Senate floor passage remains the harder test.
