CLARITY Act to be reviewed in mid-April: Stablecoin yields compromised, DeFi protected

In April 2026, the long-running standoff on digital-asset regulation in the U.S. Capitol is moving toward a critical inflection point. The Senate Banking Committee plans to conduct a committee review of the “Digital Asset Markets CLARITY Act” in mid-April (after the Easter recess ends). Based on recent remarks by multiple lawmakers, the final legislative text is expected to be released within the next few days.

This push marks the final sprint of a crypto regulatory- and rulemaking legislative tug-of-war that has lasted several years. If the bill is passed within the current congressional cycle, it will fundamentally reshape the U.S. regulatory framework for digital assets: it will clearly define the jurisdictional boundary between the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), provide legal protection for decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, and regulate the stablecoin market. However, the compromises on key provisions—especially the limits on passive yield from stablecoins—also reveal the structural costs the industry is paying in its pursuit of regulatory clarity.

CLARITY Act Committee Review Schedule Confirmed

According to statements recently made by Senator Cynthia Lummis at an industry summit, the committee review of the CLARITY Act is set to take place in the second half of April. This window is viewed as a “decisive moment” in the legislative process. Lummis emphasized that if the window is missed, meaningful crypto legislation could be pushed back to 2027.

The chair of the Senate Banking Committee, Tim Scott, confirmed at an industry meeting in mid-March that the “first proposal” related to stablecoin yield would be formed within that week. At the same time, Lummis said that the disputed issues in the bill regarding DeFi have largely been resolved. Many market observers believe lawmakers are intentionally compressing the review timeline in order to provide the digital-asset industry with a definite legal framework before the mid-2026 election cycle fully gets underway. This political schedule has itself become a core variable driving the bill’s momentum.

If the committee review proceeds smoothly, the bill is expected to complete a Senate vote before the fourth quarter of 2026. But given the House agenda and the presidential-signing process, the final effective date remains uncertain.

A Legislative Long Run From Chaos to Clarity

The CLARITY Act did not appear out of nowhere. It traces back to multiple prior failed legislative attempts, including the Lummis-Gillibrand Responsible Financial Innovation Act. Its central goal has always been the same: to end the multi-year jurisdictional “turf war” between the SEC and the CFTC. This conflict has largely been resolved in the past through enforcement actions, leaving the industry facing a high level of uncertainty.

Key milestones:

• 2022–2024: The industry went through multiple waves of enforcement storms. Events such as the FTX collapse accelerated the political urgency for congressional legislation.
• 2025: After the new Congress took office, crypto legislation was placed on the priority agenda. Stablecoin regulation (GENIUS Act) and the market-structure bill (CLARITY) advanced along separate tracks.
• Q1 2026: Legislative negotiations moved into deep water. Banking lobbying groups and the crypto industry clashed fiercely over the issue of stablecoin yield.
• March 2026: Senator Lummis announced that the bill text is about to be finalized, and the committee review schedule was locked in for mid-April.

This timeline shows that the final shape of the bill is not purely a technical design, but the result of bargaining and compromise among multiple political forces within specific time windows.

Evolution and Costs of the Bill’s Core Provisions

As the CLARITY Act advanced, its text underwent significant changes. The most controversial provisions are concentrated in two areas: stablecoin yield and the definition of DeFi.

According to industry estimates, changes to the stablecoin yield provisions directly affect an annual revenue scale of roughly $1.35 billion, which is about equivalent to 20% of the business revenue of a major crypto exchange platform. This figure clearly explains why the provision became a focal point of the negotiation battle.

Banking lobbying groups are the main force pushing to limit stablecoin yield. They argue that such yield effectively constitutes a substitute for deposits, threatening the deposit base of traditional banks. Platforms such as Coinbase have publicly said they reject earlier versions of the bill and, together with the industry, have put forward counterproposals.

Major Divisions Within the Industry

The industry is not a unified block around the CLARITY Act. The main differences center on the tradeoff between “compliance costs” and “regulatory clarity.”

• Pro-support camp (pragmatic compromise theory): Represented by some large institutions and industry associations. They believe that obtaining a clear regulatory framework—especially protections for DeFi and CFTC jurisdiction—outranks preserving passive yield from stablecoins as a single product feature. In the long run, clarity will open the gates for institutional capital inflows; its value far exceeds the business lines that would be sacrificed.
• Opposition camp (defend-the-principle theory): Represented by some native crypto projects and KOLs (such as Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson). They argue that banning passive yield denies crypto finance’s core innovation (programmable money and permissionless finance). They criticize the move as capitulation to traditional financial power, saying the bill’s “clarity” comes at the cost of the industry’s core value.
• Wait-and-see camp (details determine everything): Includes most DeFi protocol developers and venture capital institutions. They are waiting for the final bill text to be released, especially the specific definition of “activity-based rewards.” If the definition is too narrow, it could choke off legitimate innovative business models; if it is relatively broad, it could become a new path for the industry to adapt and evolve.

At its core, this split is a debate over two development routes for the crypto industry: “integrating into the mainstream financial system” versus “preserving native disruption.” Passing the bill will, in the short term, make the institutional costs of the former path explicit.

Reassessing Narrative Authenticity: Separating Facts From Expectations

During key moments as the bill advances, various narratives circulate in the market. We need to examine them carefully.

• Narrative 1: “The CLARITY Act will end all regulatory uncertainty”
  • The bill primarily addresses top-level jurisdiction and basic market-structure issues. It will not resolve every individual case—for example, the classification of the security status of a specific token will still require case-by-case analysis based on the bill’s principles. Regulatory uncertainty will be greatly reduced, but it will not disappear completely.
• Narrative 2: “DeFi has received full exemption”
  • The compromise direction known so far does provide key protection for non-custodial protocols. But issues such as how “activity-based rewards” are defined and the nature of governance tokens could still trigger new controversies in later regulatory details. “Full exemption” is an oversimplification.
• Narrative 3: “Stablecoin yield is completely shut down”
  • What is being shut down is “passive yield” (i.e., interest-like yield generated simply by holding). Allowed “activity-based rewards” leave room for compliant innovation—for example, reward mechanisms tied to payment frequency or loyalty programs. Therefore, it is not “completely shut down,” but rather a reconstruction of the logic for how yield is generated.

Impact Analysis: From Market Structure to Institutional Adoption

If the CLARITY Act passes, its impact will be multi-layered and structural.

• Impact on market structure: The jurisdictional split between the CFTC and the SEC will end the “selective enforcement” model. When projects issue tokens, they will have a clearer path to judge compliance requirements, which reduces legal-risk cost. This will help the U.S. market regain its position as the center of crypto innovation and attract projects that previously flowed abroad back home.
• Impact on institutional adoption: This is the bill’s most direct target. A clear regulatory framework is the prerequisite for entry by traditional financial institutions (banks, asset managers, pension funds). The bill provides compliant pathways for custody, trading, and derivatives, accelerating the inclusion of assets explicitly classified as “digital commodities,” such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, into mainstream asset allocation.
• Spillover effects to RWA and stablecoins: The stablecoin regulatory framework (the GENIUS Act, advancing in parallel with the CLARITY Act) will clarify its compliant issuance and operating model. Limiting passive yield may prompt stablecoin issuers to explore more payment use cases that connect with the real economy. At the same time, regulatory clarity will remove the biggest legal obstacle to tokenization of real-world assets (RWAs), accelerating development in this track.

Multi-Scenario Evolution Forecast

Based on current information, we can model several scenarios that may emerge for the CLARITY Act in the coming months.

Conclusion

The CLARITY Act’s committee review process signals a paradigm shift in U.S. crypto regulation—from the era of “chaos and enforcement” to the era of “frameworks and compliance.” This shift is not without cost: the industry made a key compromise on the specific battleground of stablecoin yield in exchange for DeFi protections and an overall improvement in regulatory clarity.

For market participants, the core task at this stage is to look through short-term sentiment swings and focus on the details of the bill’s final text—especially the criteria for defining “activity-based rewards” and the specific principles for asset classification. No matter what form the bill ultimately takes when implemented, one clear fact is taking shape: the institutionalized survival pathway for the crypto industry in the U.S. will be definitively defined in the coming months. And the outcome of this legislative bargaining battle will profoundly affect the future global crypto industry and the direction of capital flows.