CLARITY Act Could Unlock 11 Crypto Activities for US Banks Under Senate Plan - Bitcoin Foundation

The CLARITY Act, as reported by the Bitcoin Foundation, is a Senate plan that could unlock 11 crypto-related activities for US banks. The significance lies less in the specific number than in the direction of travel: rather than treating digital assets as an exception to be walled off, the proposal would define categories of activity that regulated banks may conduct. That framing matters because it shifts the debate from whether banks can touch crypto at all to how they would do so under existing supervisory expectations.

For markets, the relevance is structural. Banks sit at the intersection of payments, custody, and credit, so clearer perimeters can influence who provides services, how liquidity is intermediated, and what compliance burdens apply. The headline figure of 11 activities is a useful marker, but the operative details are the definitions, conditions, and limits attached to each.

What to watch: the bill's progress through the Senate, the final list of permitted activities, and how agencies translate any passed text into rules. Until those steps are complete, the proposal remains a signal of intent rather than a settled change.