Senate Majority Leader John Thune filed cloture on the motion to proceed for the CLARITY Act, setting a procedural vote for September 15. But the bill's path is narrowing fast: Galaxy Research cut its passage probability from 50% to 30%, and Grayscale is already preparing for the possibility that Congress won't deliver a comprehensive crypto market structure bill this year.
A 60-vote climb
Republicans don't have the numbers to move the bill on their own. They'll need at least seven Democrats or independents to join them, and the sticking points haven't softened. Ethical disagreements, illicit finance rules, and language from the Senate Agriculture Committee are still unresolved. The Senate calendar isn't helping either—the August recess is over, but midterm election season is already eating up floor time. Grayscale acknowledged that agreement is still possible, but the window is closing.
What happens if it fails
Grayscale has laid out alternative paths for crypto regulation if the CLARITY Act stalls. The CFTC and SEC can keep developing rules and interpretations even without new legislation, though they can't establish permanent jurisdictional boundaries on their own. That still leaves room to address tokenized securities, custody, and trading—areas where institutional interest has grown through spot ETFs, stablecoins, and tokenized real-world assets. Wall Street's participation has made these questions more urgent, not less.
The stablecoin win
Some progress has already been made. The GENIUS Act gave payment stablecoins a federal framework, and Grayscale's Head of Research Zach Pandl called that a major win. It's a narrower piece of the puzzle, but it shows Congress can move on crypto when the scope is tight enough. The question is whether the broader market structure bill can survive the same process.
The September 15 vote is the concrete test. If it falls short, expect agency-led rulemaking to take center stage, with Grayscale's fallback becoming the de facto roadmap. The midterm calendar leaves little room for a second attempt before the year ends, so this vote may be the last real shot at a comprehensive bill in 2026.
