Galaxy Digital’s head of research Alex Thorn has reduced his estimate for the CLARITY Act’s passage in 2026 to 60% from a prior 75%, warning that an increasingly congested Senate timetable is undermining expectations for progress by the July 4 marker previously cited by lawmakers.

Analyst Views

Thorn communicated the change in a note to clients and in a June 5 post, emphasizing that his forecast reflects scheduling realities rather than a reversal in political appetite for crypto market-structure legislation. He underscored that support for the bill “has not collapsed,” but that time constraints now dominate the outlook. In his assessment, a Senate calendar crowded with competing priorities has become the determining factor for the near-term trajectory of the bill, leading him to trim the probability of enactment this year to 60%.

Key Factors

The immediate bottleneck, according to Thorn, is the Senate’s agenda in the coming days. Following a failed vote to reauthorize FISA, he expects the chamber to devote substantial floor time to related business next week, limiting opportunities for crypto legislation to move ahead. That dynamic has shifted the conversation from whether lawmakers want to advance the bill to whether they can find the procedural bandwidth to do so before the summer window narrows.

Two unresolved matters continue to complicate the process: lawmaker ethics provisions and illicit finance measures connected to the legislation. With neither issue settled, they remain open questions that could demand further negotiation and consume additional time. Thorn’s updated view incorporates those sticking points, which he sees as additive to the broader scheduling crunch that is already constraining the Senate’s capacity.

Market Outlook

The revised forecast does not suggest a fundamental change in the bill’s policy aims. The CLARITY Act is widely regarded as the most consequential crypto measure before Congress, designed to delineate regulatory responsibilities between the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Under the proposal, tokens classified as commodities would come under CFTC oversight, while those deemed securities would remain with the SEC. Proponents argue that settling this jurisdictional debate would reduce uncertainty for digital-asset businesses, reshape how trading venues operate, and define the compliance standards that crypto projects must meet.

Supporters also contend that codifying those boundaries could help keep development in the United States by offering clearer rules of the road. From a market-structure standpoint, backers view statutory clarity as a prerequisite for scaling institutional participation, standardizing exchange practices, and improving the predictability of project launches. Thorn’s updated odds do not challenge those arguments; rather, they reflect the practical challenges of moving complex legislation through a packed calendar.

Timeline Pressure

Senator Cynthia Lummis had previously flagged July 4 as a target for getting market-structure legislation moving in the Senate. Thorn’s revised assessment effectively tightens the time available to meet that informal milestone. With FISA matters expected to dominate near-term proceedings, the space for crypto legislation appears narrower than it did when Thorn initially set his estimate at 75% immediately after markup.

Importantly, Thorn frames the current obstacle as one of process and sequencing, not a loss of momentum for the bill itself. In his view, the path forward hinges on whether the Senate can allocate the necessary floor time amid other priorities and on resolving the open questions around ethics rules and illicit finance provisions. Until those pieces align, he expects the timeline to remain more fluid than stakeholders had assumed earlier in the year.

Future Trends

For crypto market participants awaiting federal guidance, Thorn’s 60% probability points to a longer and potentially uneven route to comprehensive legislation. The near-term backdrop suggests that expectations may need to accommodate procedural delays, even as the underlying policy rationale for the bill persists. Should the Senate’s schedule continue to crowd out floor action, the window associated with the July 4 marker could narrow further, extending the period of uncertainty around market structure.

Thorn maintains an overall optimistic stance on eventual passage, but his latest projection emphasizes the primacy of timing and process. The coming weeks will be shaped by how much bandwidth Senate leaders devote to FISA-related work and whether negotiators can make headway on the bill’s unresolved elements. Until then, the forecast for crypto market-structure reform remains constructive but less certain on the original timetable, with the probability of 2026 passage now set at 60% rather than 75%.

Featured image from Unsplash; chart from TradingView.