The Clarity Act contains a grandfather clause that permanently freezes the classification of assets whose spot ETFs were listed before that date. Bitcoin qualifies: the spot ETFs were approved in January 2024. If the law passes as it is, Bitcoin will forever be a commodity under CFTC jurisdiction. The SEC will no longer be able to touch it. No future administration, no new Gary Gensler will be able to reopen the dossier.
The law also resolves a decade-long war between two federal agencies. The SEC wanted everything as a security. The CFTC had considered Bitcoin a commodity since 2015. In between, exchanges, brokers and custodians operating in limbo. The Clarity Act creates new federal categories: digital commodity exchange, digital commodity dealer, digital commodity broker. Three CFTC registrations that do not exist today. Until now these entities lived on unsuitable state licenses or makeshift SEC registrations.
For the banks: the rescission of SAB 121 unlocked about 115 billion dollars in custody, but it remains an administrative guidance. A new administration can overturn it tomorrow. The Clarity Act amends federal banking legislation directly. Payments, lending, custody, trading on digital assets become banking activities regulated by law, not by revocable administrative guidance.
Open knots remain. The provision on conflicts of interest for government officials — read the Trump family and World Liberty Financial — is still on the table. The stablecoins open a loophole that six banking associations have already flagged in writing to the Senate: programs can be built that reward the balance but are formally activated by a minimum number of transactions. A deposit yield without the rules on deposits.
For the single bitcoiner, little changes. For the institutions that were waiting for regulatory certainty before entering, everything changes.
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The law also resolves a decade-long war between two federal agencies. The SEC wanted everything as a security. The CFTC had considered Bitcoin a commodity since 2015. In between, exchanges, brokers and custodians operating in limbo. The Clarity Act creates new federal categories: digital commodity exchange, digital commodity dealer, digital commodity broker. Three CFTC registrations that do not exist today. Until now these entities lived on unsuitable state licenses or makeshift SEC registrations.
For the banks: the rescission of SAB 121 unlocked about 115 billion dollars in custody, but it remains an administrative guidance. A new administration can overturn it tomorrow. The Clarity Act amends federal banking legislation directly. Payments, lending, custody, trading on digital assets become banking activities regulated by law, not by revocable administrative guidance.
Open knots remain. The provision on conflicts of interest for government officials — read the Trump family and World Liberty Financial — is still on the table. The stablecoins open a loophole that six banking associations have already flagged in writing to the Senate: programs can be built that reward the balance but are formally activated by a minimum number of transactions. A deposit yield without the rules on deposits.
For the single bitcoiner, little changes. For the institutions that were waiting for regulatory certainty before entering, everything changes.
naddr1qqnk...
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