The recently released text of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act (CLARITY) in the US Senate Banking Committee is raising some eyebrows among experts before a scheduled Thursday markup for provisions on housing and the lack of ethics language.
On Monday, three Republican lawmakers unveiled the text of the bill lawmakers will use to consider advancing crypto market structure legislation in the banking committee. It followed drafts released in July and September 2025, building upon discussions between crypto and banking industry representatives over stablecoin yield.
Text of CLARITY Act. Source: US Senate Banking Committee
However, the latest version includes provisions seemingly unrelated to crypto market structure. In the last pages of the legislation was a provision on housing called the Build Now Act, which, according to a section-by-section summary of the text, was aimed at creating โa pilot program to incentivize housing development of all kinds in certain Community Development Block Grant participating jurisdictions.โ
According to Senators Tim Scott, Cynthia Lummis, and Thom Tillis, the bill reflected โcontinued negotiations with Democratic colleagues,โ signaling bipartisan support in Thursdayโs markup. However, some Senate Democrats, including Kirsten Gillibrand, said that they would not vote for market structure on the floor without clear provisions on ethics to address potential conflicts of interest.
โWe have worked too hard on this bill to give up now,โ Senator Angela Alsobrooks, who sits on the banking committee and announced the stablecoin yield compromise with Tillis, told Cointelegraph. โMy hope is to get to a bipartisan markup on Thursday with a compromise on ethics.โ
Related: Seven Democrats seen as โkeyโ to advancing CLARITY Act: Galaxy
The CLARITY Act is expected to give the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) more authority in overseeing and regulating digital assets, in a shift of roles usually handled by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The Senate Agriculture Committee passed its version of the bill in a January markup, but the legislation must pass the banking committee, full Senate, and reconcile in the House of Representatives before potentially being signed into law.
Whatโs in the bill?
CLARITY explicitly prohibits paying interest or yield on payment stablecoins, with the exception of โrewards or incentives based on bona fide activities or bona fide transactions that are not economically or functionally equivalent to the payment of interest or yield on an interest-bearing bank deposit.โ
The bill also included language from the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act, legislation proposed to protect developers from money transmitter requirements. The advocacy organization DeFi Education Fund said in a Monday X post that it was โencouraged by the direction of recent negotiationsโ over the bill, noting the software developer protections.
Lawmakers did not include any provisions on ethics related to Democratsโ concerns over US President Donald Trumpโs crypto ventures, such as his memecoin and his familyโs World Liberty Financial business.
โThis bill puts investors, our national security and our entire financial system at risk โ and it will turbocharge Donald Trumpโs crypto corruption,โ said Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren in response to the bill. โIn just one year in office, the President and his family have raked in at least $1.4 billion in gains from crypto deals alone, and yet this bill stunningly includes zero provisions to prevent that.โ
The Senate Agriculture Committee voted along party lines to advance the bill in January, but the legislation would require 60 votes to pass the Senate even if the same were to happen in the banking committee on Thursday. When stablecoin payments legislation, the GENIUS Act, was under consideration in the Senate in June 2025, many Democrats joined with Republicans to pass the bill in a 68-30 bipartisan vote.
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