CLARITY Act and Stablecoins: What the Senate Stall Means for Latin American Companies

The CLARITY Act was meant to be the second major US crypto statute, after the GENIUS Act. On 15 September 2026 it fell 11 votes short of opening debate in the Senate. For a Latin American finance team that pays or collects in stablecoins, the headline raises fair questions: does the daily operation change, is the US framework left half built, and what should be monitored?

At Soulbit Academy we distinguish an enacted law from requirements already in effect. The CLARITY vote does not change daily operations with USDC or USDT. The GENIUS Act was enacted in 2025, but its issuer requirements take effect in January 2027. What stays open is the legal treatment of other digital assets and of the US intermediaries that trade them. This article reports the facts as of 3 November 2026 and does not forecast the legislative calendar.

What the CLARITY Act proposed and why it matters for stablecoins

The CLARITY Act is the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, filed as H.R. 3633, a US bill on how digital asset markets are structured. Its goal was to decide who supervises what: when a crypto asset is treated as a security and when as a commodity. The official Congress.gov record lists every action on the bill.

According to the October 2026 analysis by the law firm Orrick, the bill had three main pieces. The first was a split of authority between two agencies. The second was a distinction between two categories of assets. The third was a federal framework that would preempt a range of state requirements for activities inside it.

The first piece gave the CFTC primary responsibility for digital commodities, their spot markets and the intermediaries that trade them. The SEC kept authority over digital securities and certain primary-market transactions. The CFTC supervises commodity and derivatives markets. The SEC supervises securities markets.

The second piece, classification, is the heart of the matter. A digital commodity is a crypto asset the text would treat as a commodity rather than a security. Today that boundary is settled case by case through litigation and agency positions. The bill tried to fix it in statute.

The third piece reached intermediaries. Exchanges, brokers and platforms trading digital assets would fall under the agency that matches the asset type. The sources consulted do not confirm the detailed registration requirements, so this article does not describe them.

CLARITY Act vs GENIUS Act: a bill and an enacted law

The GENIUS Act establishes a framework for payment stablecoin issuers; it was enacted in 2025 and is scheduled to take effect in 2027. The CLARITY Act sought to organize the market for other digital assets and has not been approved. Mixing up their legislative status may lead a treasury to apply future obligations too early.

The GENIUS Act was signed on 18 July 2025 and is Public Law 119-27. It defines who may issue a payment stablecoin, with what reserves and under what supervision. We cover it in GENIUS Act and Stablecoins: What Changes for Latin American Companies and its rulemaking in GENIUS Act Rulemaking: FinCEN, OCC and the Real Timeline.

Aspect	GENIUS Act	CLARITY Act
Subject	Payment stablecoin issuers	Structure of digital asset markets
Question it answers	Who may issue, with what reserves and under what license	Which agency supervises which asset: SEC or CFTC
Status in November 2026	Enacted on 18 July 2025; scheduled to take effect on 18 January 2027	Not approved: the Senate procedural vote failed 49-50 on 15 September 2026
Instrument	Public Law 119-27, originating in bill S. 1582	Bill H.R. 3633, passed by the House but not the Senate
Link to USDC and USDT	Direct: sets the issuers' rules	Indirect: covers other assets and the intermediaries that trade them
Effect on the user company	Indirect and future: new issuer rules once effective	None in force: the text never became law

The two are complementary. GENIUS created a statutory framework for payment stablecoins, while CLARITY aimed at assets whose legal nature remains contested. The CLARITY stall does not change the GENIUS Act's effective date.

How the bill moved: House, Banking Committee and the 15 September vote

The CLARITY Act cleared two stages before stalling at the third, the full Senate. The House of Representatives passed it on 17 July 2025 by 294 votes to 134. The Senate Banking Committee advanced it on 14 May 2026 by 15 votes to 9. The full Senate remained.

On 15 September 2026 the Senate voted on cloture on the motion to proceed, the step that allows debate to begin. The official Senate daily record confirms that vote 234 ended with 49 in favor and 50 against. The rule required three-fifths, or 60 votes.

Was this the final vote on the bill?

No. It was a procedural vote, not a vote on the content. Its rejection means the Senate did not open debate. The text was neither amended nor voted on as a whole. According to the official record of roll call vote 234, the no votes included Senators Collins, Hawley, Moran and Tillis. The latest action recorded on Congress.gov is a motion to reconsider, a procedural device that allows a new vote.

Why the CLARITY Act stalled in the Senate

The CLARITY Act stalled because it did not gather the 60 procedural votes, and according to Orrick two disputes weighed most. The first concerned ethics provisions on crypto assets held by federal officials. The second concerned stablecoin yield.

The yield dispute links back to the GENIUS Act. Once effective, that law will bar an authorized issuer from paying interest to holders. The CLARITY debate centered on whether third parties, such as platforms, could offer yield on stablecoins. Opponents argued such products could draw balances away from traditional credit institutions. The question is not only American: it decides whether a stablecoin is a payment instrument or an investment product.

What is documented is the tally, 49 to 50 with 60 needed, and the two main obstacles identified by the legal analysis cited. What is not documented, and this article does not speculate on, is what happens to the bill next.

Does a 49-50 tally mean the bill is dead?

Not necessarily, and it does not mean it will advance either. The motion to reconsider recorded after the vote is a procedural fact. What can be said as of 3 November 2026 is that the Senate has not approved the bill and that the GENIUS Act does not depend on it.

GENIUS Act: enactment and effective date

The GENIUS Act has been enacted, but its principal issuer requirements are not yet effective. The statute provides for 1-to-1 reserves, monthly disclosure of reserve composition and authorization for issuers. The Senate passed it by 68 votes to 30, and the House by 308 to 122.

Under section 20 of the statute, the Act takes effect on the earlier of 18 January 2027 or 120 days after federal regulators issue a final rule. The OCC confirmed in its final rule that the resulting date is 18 January 2027. Other regulators continue their own rulemaking.

Once the Act takes effect, an issuer of USDC or USDT within its US scope must comply with GENIUS regardless of CLARITY. To understand what USDC is in a treasury, see what is USDC and how it works for companies.

What the CLARITY Act stall means for a Latin American company that holds stablecoins

For a Latin American company, the CLARITY stall does not change daily operations with stablecoins. Collecting from a client, paying a supplier or holding a balance in USDC or USDT remains subject to currently applicable rules and local law. New GENIUS requirements for US issuers will apply when that Act takes effect; its timetable does not depend on CLARITY.

The effect that does exist is uncertainty, and it is concentrated in one place: US intermediaries. A company dealing with US platforms, brokers or exchanges remains exposed to a split of agency authority that is resolved case by case rather than by statute. That affects those intermediaries, not the issuer rule.

A hypothetical example, with assumed figures and not Soulbit prices: a software company in Medellín holds the equivalent of 200,000 US dollars in USDC to pay contractors. If the issuer falls within GENIUS's scope, it will face new requirements once the Act takes effect. The CLARITY stall changes neither that timetable nor the company's Colombian tax treatment.

Company area	What changes after the CLARITY stall	What to do
Collections and payments in USDC or USDT	The vote does not change currently applicable or local rules	Keep the usual operation and accounting records
Balance in payment stablecoins	GENIUS will add issuer requirements once effective	Review any reserve disclosures the issuer publishes
US intermediaries	Uncertainty over SEC and CFTC treatment persists	Ask the counterparty which regulator supervises it and which license it holds
Digital assets other than stablecoins	Their classification is still not fixed by statute	Do not build treasury on assets of uncertain classification
Yield on stablecoins	The debate remains open in the US	Leave yield out of treasury projections
Local obligations	Nothing: DIAN, SAT or the local authority still apply	Consult local accounting and tax advisers

Three questions help a treasury sort this out. The first is which asset it uses, since a payment stablecoin falls within GENIUS. The second is which intermediary it works with and which regulator supervises it. The third is what local obligations it has, which have not changed. For the regional picture see Latin America crypto regulation landscape 2026.

Should a Latin American company stop using stablecoins because of this stall?

Nothing in the sources consulted requires it. The stall affects a market-structure bill, not the rule that governs payment stablecoin issuers. The decision to use stablecoins depends on each company's treasury policy, local regulation and risk appetite, not on this parliamentary result.

What Soulbit delivers today on this framework, and what it does not

Soulbit does not issue stablecoins and does not operate as a securities intermediary. It is a custodial financial platform for people and companies, with institutional MPC custody, KYB verification and AML and KYT monitoring. Its V1 works with USDC and USDT, fiat in USD, EUR and GBP, and a local bank rail only in Colombia. See institutional MPC custody for a company balance.

Soulbit lets a company disperse recurring and batch payroll in stablecoin, issue payment links, use collection QR codes and convert by OTC quote on request. It is custodial: the company does not control the balance's keys, which sit with the institutional custodian.

Soulbit makes no yield promise and has no proprietary token, and does not claim compliance with US rules that are not documented. It does not advise on asset classification between the SEC and the CFTC. Soulbit does not need a license under the CLARITY Act, because the bill is not law, and it is not an issuer subject to GENIUS. What does depend on how issuer regulation evolves is the soundness of the underlying USDC and USDT.