Here’s what happened in crypto today

Today in crypto, the US Senate Banking Committee advances the CLARITY Act, the Bank of England (BoE) weighs easing UK stablecoin caps and reserve demands after industry backlash, and US banks expect a digitized finance system to start “slow, then fast.”

US Senate Banking Committee advances CLARITY Act after it stalled for months 

The United States Senate Banking Committee voted to advance the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act (CLARITY) on Thursday, following months of stalled progress on the crypto market structure bill.

All 13 Republican members of the Committee voted in favor of the bill and were joined by Democratic Senators Ruben Gallego and Angela Alsobrooks. Following the vote, Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis said:

“Thanks to the folks from Treasury and Patrick Witt from the White House. Honestly, without their involvement, I don't think we could have gotten as much done. The agencies went from offering technical assistance to really rolling up their sleeves and helping with this bill.”

Senator Cynthia Lummis addresses the Senate Banking Committee during the CLARITY markup. Source: GOP Senate Banking Committee

The CLARITY Act would codify clear rules of the road for the crypto industry in the United States, ending years of regulatory uncertainty and the possibility of a future administration rolling back the regulatory progress that has occurred since the 2024 US elections.

Bank of England reconsiders strict stablecoin regime

The Bank of England is reconsidering parts of its proposed regime for pound sterling stablecoins after digital asset companies warned that holding caps and reserve requirements could stifle adoption and make UK-issued tokens uneconomic.

The central bank is looking at alternatives to temporary caps on how many stablecoins individuals and businesses can hold, and is examining whether its requirement that at least 40% of backing assets be held as non-interest-bearing deposits at the BoE is overly conservative, Deputy Governor Sarah Breeden told the Financial Times.

The rethink comes as the UK government and regulators try to position Britain as a competitive hub for digital assets while containing risks to bank funding and financial stability. Sterling-pegged tokens currently make up a tiny fraction of the roughly $300 billion global stablecoin market, which remains dominated by dollar-based issuers.

The BoE set out detailed ownership limits in its November 2025 consultation paper on a proposed regulatory regime for sterling-denominated systemic stablecoins, building on options first aired in a 2023 discussion paper.

Under that proposal, individuals would be restricted to holding up to 20,000 pounds (roughly $27,000) of a given UK stablecoin, while businesses would be capped at roughly $13.5 million, at least during an initial transition period.

Stablecoins Discussion Paper, 2023. Source: Bank of England

US banks see “slow, then fast” shift to digitized finance

Major US banks expect the transition to a digitized financial system is inevitable and would start “slow, then fast,” with tokenization increasing and extending to more market participants, assets and use cases, the credit rating agency Moody’s said in a a report on Tuesday.

“Across our conversations, industry leaders generally believed that broad asset tokenization will happen; the main uncertainties center around how quickly and in what sequence,” Moody’s said.

Tokenization has been of major interest to institutions that is expected to also be a windfall for crypto, with ARK Invest predicting the crypto market value to $28 trillion by 2030, with Bitcoin, decentralized finance, stablecoins and tokenized assets as key drivers.

Moody’s predicts there are three possible outcomes for the financial system depending on the pace of tokenization. Source: Moody’s

Moody’s said current tokenization activity is low, but “almost all large banks and major financial market intermediaries have established dedicated digital-asset teams or innovation units and are participating in industry pilots to test new infrastructure.”