The Clarity Act has reportedly secured enough committee backing ahead of today’s Senate Banking Committee markup, giving the crypto market structure bill its strongest momentum in months.
The Senate Banking Committee released updated market structure bill text this week ahead of the markup, with Chairman Tim Scott, Senator Cynthia Lummis, and Senator Thom Tillis backing the revised package. The committee also published the substitute text for H.R. 3633, the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, before the scheduled vote.
The reported majority support follows months of negotiations over stablecoin rewards, SEC and CFTC jurisdiction, anti-money laundering provisions, decentralized finance treatment, and software developer protections. A previous January markup was postponed after Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said the company could not support the bill in its earlier form. Reuters reported at the time that the delay followed industry pushback over tokenized equities, DeFi language, CFTC authority, stablecoin rewards, and privacy concerns.
Stablecoin Compromise Helped Revive Momentum
One of the biggest obstacles in negotiations had been stablecoin rewards and whether issuers or platforms could offer yield-like incentives tied to dollar-backed tokens.
Armstrong now says the latest version is in “the best place we’ve seen so far” and that Coinbase is ready to support the markup, according to Fox Business. That shift gives the bill a stronger industry signal than it had in January, when Coinbase’s opposition helped derail the earlier committee schedule.
The revised Senate text attempts to separate idle-balance rewards from payment-linked incentives. Banks have pushed for tighter restrictions, arguing that stablecoin rewards could pull deposits away from the traditional banking system. Crypto firms have argued that a broad ban would weaken payment competition and hand banks too much control over digital-dollar products.
That compromise has become central to the bill’s path. Recent market-structure coverage has focused on how lawmakers are trying to balance banking concerns, stablecoin competition, crypto exchange oversight, and a workable path for digital asset platforms.
SEC And CFTC Split Remains The Core Issue
Beyond stablecoins, the Clarity Act would reshape how crypto platforms operate in the United States. The legislation aims to draw clearer lines between SEC and CFTC oversight, setting standards for digital commodity trading, custody, token issuance, and intermediary obligations.
Galaxy’s policy analysis said the Senate Banking version goes beyond the House-passed bill by adding titles covering securities innovation, illicit finance, DeFi, banking activities, software developer protections, customer property treatment in bankruptcy, and other market-structure issues.
Committee approval would not make the bill law. It would move the legislation into the next stage of Senate negotiations, where floor time, amendments, Democratic support, banking-sector pressure, and coordination with Senate Agriculture would still shape the final outcome.
The markup now gives lawmakers the first concrete test of whether the compromise can survive formal votes. If the committee majority holds, the next focus will shift to amendments, Senate floor math, and whether the bill can preserve enough support from both crypto firms and banking interests to become the first comprehensive U.S. crypto market structure framework.
