The president is releasing the finalized version of legislation that would split crypto oversight between the SEC and CFTC, ending years of regulatory ambiguity.
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byEditorial Team
Jul. 16, 2026
President Trump is set to approve and release the final text of the crypto market structure bill, a move that could reshape how digital assets are regulated in the US. The legislation, known as the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act (or the CLARITY Act), has been grinding through Congress for over a year, and Trump’s sign-off on the final language marks a critical inflection point.
The bill’s core mission is deceptively simple: figure out which federal agency is actually in charge of crypto. In English, that means drawing a clear line between the SEC and the CFTC, two regulators that have spent years in a jurisdictional tug-of-war over digital assets. The CLARITY Act would hand the CFTC authority over “digital commodities” while limiting the SEC’s involvement to assets that look and act more like securities.
A long road to the finish line
The House passed the CLARITY Act back in July 2025 with a 294-134 vote, a surprisingly bipartisan result that included 78 Democrats crossing the aisle. The Senate Banking Committee advanced the bill in May 2026 with a 15-9 vote. But the legislation has been parked on the Senate Legislative Calendar as Calendar No. 423 ever since, stuck in a holding pattern over ethics provisions.
The ethics fight is directly tied to Trump’s personal crypto portfolio. The president’s gains through the digital asset space reportedly exceeded $2 billion in 2025, largely through his involvement with World Liberty Financial and its $WLFI token. Democrats have been understandably fixated on the conflict-of-interest question: should a president who stands to benefit enormously from crypto-friendly regulation be the one shaping that regulation?
Trump originally projected the bill would pass by July 4, 2026. That deadline came and went. His meeting with senators on July 16 was designed to hammer out the remaining sticking points, particularly around provisions governing officials’ digital asset holdings.
What the bill actually does
The CLARITY Act builds on a regulatory foundation that Trump already helped establish. The GENIUS Act, which focused specifically on stablecoins, was signed into law in 2025. The market structure bill goes much further, attempting to create a comprehensive framework for the entire digital asset ecosystem.
The key mechanism is a redefinition of “digital commodity” that would fall under CFTC jurisdiction. The bill doesn’t name specific tokens or projects. Instead, it establishes broad definitional categories, letting the market sort itself into the appropriate regulatory buckets.
What this means for investors
Regulatory ambiguity has been one of the biggest barriers keeping institutional capital on the sidelines. A finalized market structure bill could unlock a wave of institutional participation, as clear rules mean compliance departments can actually build frameworks, custodians can expand their offerings, and fund managers can allocate without fearing a surprise enforcement action.
But the ethics cloud isn’t going away. Even if Trump releases the final text, Senate passage is far from guaranteed. The conflict-of-interest concerns have given Democratic senators political cover to delay or demand amendments. Any changes at the Senate level could send the bill back to the House, restarting parts of the legislative process.
Multiple countries have already implemented comprehensive digital asset frameworks, and US-based projects have increasingly looked offshore for regulatory certainty. Every month the CLARITY Act stalls is another month the US cedes ground in the global race to define digital asset regulation.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
