BlackRock and $30 Trillion in Wall Street Backing Can't Get the Clarity Act to the Senate Floor
The biggest names in traditional finance just put their weight behind the Clarity Act. It still isn't enough to get the bill a Senate floor vote before the August recess.
WALL STREET LINES UP BEHIND THE BILL
BlackRock, Charles Schwab, Fidelity, Goldman Sachs, and Grayscale have backed the legislation, representing organizations with more than $30 trillion in combined assets under management and administration. Franklin Templeton and SoFi followed with their own endorsements days later, as BlackRock, Fidelity, Franklin Templeton, Goldman Sachs and SoFi have publicly endorsed the crypto market structure bill as the Senate's timeline tightens.
That kind of institutional weight is hard for any senator to wave off. It arrived anyway into a Senate calendar that had no room for it.
THE SENATE HAS OTHER PLANS
Majority Leader John Thune moved first on a bundle of federal nominations, then shifted the floor to a Russia sanctions bill. That bill now carries added weight: it is tied to the memory of Senator Lindsey Graham, who died this week, with memorial services for Senator Graham held Tuesday and Wednesday in Washington and South Carolina also diverting Senate attention and consuming valuable legislative time.
Senate rules only allow one contested bill to move through cloture at a time, which pushes the Clarity Act further back in line. A vote is not expected before next week, leaving only a handful of legislative days before the recess begins on August 8.
THE STICKING POINT THAT WON'T GO AWAY
Even with the floor time question aside, the main sticking point remains the ethics provision barring top US officials, including President Trump, from supporting or participating in crypto projects. The bill needs 60 votes to pass the Senate, meaning roughly seven to ten Democrats must cross over, and as of this week none had committed publicly.
RUSSIA ALREADY MOVED
While the US Senate spends its remaining floor time on sanctions aimed at Moscow, Russia passed its own crypto framework days earlier. Russia passed a long-awaited law establishing a legal framework for cryptocurrency trading, allowing Russians to buy and sell major digital assets through Central Bank-regulated intermediaries while maintaining a ban on using cryptocurrencies for domestic payments.
The new rules require exchanges, brokers, custodians and other service providers to obtain Central Bank licenses by July 1, 2027. Retail investors classified as non-qualified, roughly 98 percent of them, face an annual cap of about 300,000 rubles, close to $3,840, through any single licensed intermediary.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT
If the Senate doesn't advance the Clarity Act before recess, debate resumes in September, the same month Russia's regulated crypto market begins phasing in. The question that decides the bill's fate isn't Wall Street's support, it's whether Thune files cloture on the Clarity Act before the chamber leaves town, and whether seven to ten Democrats are willing to be the ones who get it there.
This story comes from the Simply Bitcoin Live show. Watch the full episode.
