Circle Shares Rise After Senate Committee Advances CLARITY Act

Circle Inc. shares rose to $128.06 after the Senate Banking Committee on May 14 advanced the 309‑page Digital Asset Market CLARITY Act, a bill that sets federal rules for stablecoins and clarifies regulatory boundaries for digital assets.

The committee approved the measure in a bipartisan executive session that considered more than 100 amendments. Votes on several amendments produced bipartisan margins, including portfolio margining, which passed 18‑6, and a proposal to create regulatory sandboxes for artificial intelligence, which passed 15‑9. A set of Democratic amendments focused on bank crypto activities and sanctions enforcement failed on party-line votes.

The legislation draws a line between Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission authority: decentralized tokens such as Bitcoin and Ethereum would be treated as digital commodities under CFTC rules, while tokens that meet the legal test for securities would remain under SEC jurisdiction. The bill also contains anti‑fraud provisions, protections for developers working on decentralized finance projects, explicit guardrails for stablecoins, limits on central bank digital currency activity, resale restrictions for insiders, and language preserving users’ rights to self‑custody.

Next steps require reconciliation with a version approved by the Senate Agriculture Committee before a full Senate floor vote, where supporters will need 60 votes to advance the measure. If the Senate clears the bill, lawmakers must reconcile the Senate text with the House bill, which previously passed 294‑134, before any final legislation can reach the president.

Vikrant Sharma, co‑founder of Cake Labs, described the bill as offering clearer rules without turning self‑custody into a permissioned activity, adding that market‑structure rules should target intermediaries that custody funds rather than developers or individual holders.

Industry estimates place the global digital asset market near $3 trillion. Final passage of the CLARITY Act will depend on Senate negotiations and agreement with the House, with supporters projecting a possible resolution by summer 2026 and opponents warning the process could stretch past the midterm elections if momentum slows.