The Senate will not vote on the Clarity Act until September, after lawmakers left Washington for recess without resolving ethics and consumer-protection provisions. OKX's Haider Rafique says bitcoin's price already reflects most of the optimism around the bill, while Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan expects the delay to bring brief volatility before markets adjust to lower odds of passage this year.
OKX global managing partner Haider Rafique says bitcoin's recent rebound already reflects most of the upside a Clarity Act passage would bring. That leaves only a rally of around 3%-4% likely if the bill clears Congress. Rafique told CoinDesk: "The market prices news ahead of time." He added that failure to pass the bill could send bitcoin potentially falling toward $55,000 before attracting significant retail buying interest.
Senate pushes vote to September
Senate Majority Leader John Thune confirmed lawmakers would not vote on the Clarity Act before the August recess, pushing the crypto market-structure bill to September. The delay follows unresolved disputes over ethics rules, illicit-finance measures and consumer protections, and the bill still needs 60 votes to clear a filibuster while Republicans hold 53 Senate seats. For a lot of 2026, the bill was also stuck in a deadlock over banking-lobby concerns about stablecoin yield.
Rafique doubts Democrats will hand Republicans the win, arguing they have little incentive to back a Republican-led bill ahead of the midterm elections. Still, he called the legislation critical to keeping crypto entrepreneurs and investment from moving offshore, pointing to companies such as Hyperliquid and Backpack that chose jurisdictions outside the U.S.
Bitwise CIO expects brief volatility
Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan said the best outcome now would be for betting-market expectations to fall sharply, since a sharp decline would remove the uncertainty that has kept traders focused on the Senate's timing. He said Polymarket odds of the legislation passing in 2026 should drop into the teens.
Such a shift could cause the crypto market to wobble briefly, Hougan said, before potentially creating conditions for a recovery in the fall. As the Senate left Washington, bitcoin recently traded above $64,400, amid the brief volatility Hougan flagged around the delay.
Sources: CoinDesk, Bitcoin Magazine, CoinGape
Trading involves risk.
Risk Disclaimer
