DISCLAIMER: GoldInvestors.news is not a registered investment, legal or tax advisor or broker/dealer. All investment/financial opinions expressed by GoldInvestors.news are from the personal research and experience of the owner of the site and are intended as educational material. Although best efforts are made to ensure that all information is accurate and up to date, occasionally unintended errors and misprints may occur.
Senator Bernie Moreno has set a firm line in the sand for crypto legislation.
His end-of-May ultimatum has transformed the CLARITY Act from a policy debate into a political countdown, marking what could be Congress’s last realistic opportunity this cycle to define how U.S. crypto markets are regulated.
Moreno’s approach signals a sharpened sense of urgency as opposition from traditional banks and the drag of Senate bureaucracy threaten to bury digital asset reform once again.
At an event in Washington on April 22, Moreno dropped the optimism and replaced it with a clear warning.
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“I think we’re going to get it done by the end of May,” he said, adding that if Congress fails to pass the CLARITY Act by then, it will become “almost impossible” to move any crypto market-structure legislation before the upcoming midterms consume the entire calendar.
The Senate Banking Committee has still not held a single vote on the bill. This is despite the fact that the House of Representatives passed its version in July 2025 by a strong bipartisan margin and the Senate Agriculture Committee approved its own version in January.
For the CLARITY Act to survive, it now must clear five steps: a Banking Committee markup, passage by 60 votes on the Senate floor, reconciliation with the Agriculture text, reconciliation with the House version, and finally, the signature of President Donald Trump.
Moreno’s focus is not only on the clock. He’s also taking a pointed stand against banking interests trying to stall stablecoin provisions. Speaking at the DC Blockchain Summit, Moreno dismissed the backlash outright, calling it “fake noise” and insisting that banks “also need to innovate.”
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His unapologetic tone came just as reports surfaced suggesting that the North Carolina Bankers Association was urging its members to push Senator Thom Tillis to roll back a compromise allowing yield-bearing stablecoins.
Meanwhile, the Digital Chamber, a leading industry advocacy group, has officially urged the Senate to move the bill to markup without delay.
The group warned that further inaction risks turning the CLARITY Act into yet another missed opportunity for long-overdue modernization of U.S. market rules.
Senator Cynthia Lummis has echoed the concern, calling the bill “our last chance” and confirming that all DeFi-related provisions are already settled.
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Yuliya Barabash, managing partner at SBSB Fintech Lawyers, noted that the Senate Banking Committee is unlikely to consider the bill in April, saying that discussions could be pushed into May.
Delay is now the greatest enemy, as the calendar collides with other major obligations, especially the nomination hearings for Kevin Warsh, President Trump’s pick to replace Jerome Powell as Federal Reserve Chair.
Every additional day of hearings for Warsh is another day that Committee time and attention are diverted away from crypto legislation. By late April, the process had already consumed multiple sessions, with the Memorial Day recess looming on May 21.
That leaves barely three working weeks in May for Senate leaders to find enough votes to reach the 60-vote threshold required for passage.
One of the biggest roadblocks in the bill involves rules governing stablecoin yield. Banks worry that high interest on digital stablecoins could cause deposit flight from smaller institutions, straining their balance sheets and undermining local financial stability.
Tillis has hinted that negotiators need more time to find common ground between legacy financial institutions and emerging blockchain-enabled firms.
The uncertainty has made its way into prediction markets, where traders are keeping close watch on the clock. On Polymarket, odds that the CLARITY Act becomes law by 2026 rose slightly after Moreno’s remarks, moving from 38 percent to the mid-40s, but remain far below what the industry would consider reassuring.
Finbold reported this week that traders have cut their expectations for passage by nearly one-third in just five days due to Senate paralysis.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has warned repeatedly that continued U.S. indecision is giving international rivals a huge head start. While Washington drags its feet, jurisdictions like Dubai and Singapore are openly inviting American crypto companies to relocate, armed with transparent licensing standards and predictable tax and tokenization frameworks.
The numbers support his warning. Global venture capital funding hit a record $297 billion in the first quarter of 2026, with a rising share of funds going to crypto and AI infrastructure projects abroad.
Moreno and his allies maintain that without the CLARITY Act, the United States will remain a laggard in a sector that is rapidly rewriting the rules of global finance.
The point of the bill, he argues, is not to bless crypto speculation but to provide clear, enforceable rules that attract responsible institutional capital while keeping innovation within U.S. borders.
As the Senate moves into the final stretch of the legislative window, the stakes are already migrating from committee rooms to trading screens.
The CLARITY Act has become not just a policy measure but a live market event, where timing, perception, and political will are all prices to be traded.
Whether Congress delivers clarity or another round of confusion will determine whether the next wave of digital finance is built under American law—or leaves it behind.
DISCLAIMER: GoldInvestors.news is not a registered investment, legal or tax advisor or broker/dealer. All investment/financial opinions expressed by GoldInvestors.news are from the personal research and experience of the owner of the site and are intended as educational material. Although best efforts are made to ensure that all information is accurate and up to date, occasionally unintended errors and misprints may occur.
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