TL;DR:
- Bessent published a column in the Wall Street Journal urging Congress to pass the CLARITY Act before the Senate runs out of legislative time.
- The White House estimated that banning stablecoin yields would raise bank lending by just 0.02% and would generate an annual loss of $800 million for users.
- The Treasury proposed new AML rules for stablecoin issuers under the GENIUS Act, with powers to block, freeze, or reject transactions.
The United States Secretary of the Treasury, Scott Bessent, is pressing Congress to pass the Digital Asset Market Clarity (CLARITY) Act. Through an opinion column published in the Wall Street Journal, the official warned that legislative time in the Senate is scarce and that American leadership in financial innovation is at stake. “Congress must pass the CLARITY Act. Time on the Senate floor is limited, and now is the moment to act,” Bessent wrote.
Bessent noted that the cryptocurrency market has surpassed three trillion dollars and that nearly one in six Americans holds digital assets, arguments that, in his view, make clear regulation of cryptocurrencies, tokenized assets, and decentralized exchanges urgent. The House of Representatives passed the bill in July 2025, but the Senate has stalled it over disputes surrounding the regulatory treatment of stablecoin yields.
Bessent: American Leadership Is at Stake
Traditional financial institutions argue that allowing those yields would significantly reduce bank credit. However, a report from the White House Council of Economic Advisers challenged that position. The body estimated that banning yields would raise total bank lending by just $2.1 billion, equivalent to 0.02% of a $12 trillion market, with a benefit of only $500 million for community banks. In contrast, the analysis calculated that such a ban would generate a welfare loss of $800 million per year from the yield users would no longer receive. President Donald Trump had already lashed out at the banking sector for using that disagreement to hold up both the CLARITY Act and the GENIUS Act.
The Debate Over Stablecoin Yields
On another front, the Treasury proposed new rules under the GENIUS Act that would require payment stablecoin issuers to implement anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing programs, as well as comply with sanctions and assume the ability to block, freeze, or reject transactions.
The new framework would treat them as financial institutions under the Bank Secrecy Act. Snir Levi, CEO of blockchain intelligence firm Nominis, warned that compliance could lead to a massive escalation of wallet freezes, transaction blocks, and asset seizures, turning issuers into gatekeepers with de facto banking powers.
