CLARITY Act Vote Doesn't Mean Congress Abandons Crypto Regulation

The CLARITY Act failed to advance in the Senate by a single vote, and Morpho's Faustine Fleuret says this has been widely misinterpreted. 'The Senate did not vote against regulating crypto, it failed to open the debate,' she explained.

Fleuret pointed out that 50 senators declined to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed because lawmakers had not agreed on ethics rules for elected officials.

For builders targeting US users, Fleuret called the setback 'real but partial.' She noted several recent federal actions: Commissioner Hester Peirce's statement on crypto vaults and onchain lending strategies, the SEC's Regulation Crypto Assets, an innovation exemption for trading tokenized NMS stocks, and a CFTC staff no-action position covering providers of passive software.

Fleuret argued that once firms build on an agency framework, it tends to stay. 'It cannot simply be erased with a stroke of a pen in 2029,' she said.